Fang in Wonderland
by zelasswilder
Summary: Fang finds himself in the world of Symphonia and the only way back home is to tag along and help a rather sarcastic red-haired ex-noble named Zelos Wilder avenge his lost friends. NOT SLASH. ZELOS&FANG CENTRIC. SET AFTER THE BOOK "FANG" AND SECOND GAME.
1. Prisoner in a New World

**Author's Notes**: I'm in love with Fang and Zelos. Also with Alice in Wonderland. I was watching the Tim Burton version of Alice and I just had this attack of ideas of Fang meeting Zelos in the new world which has sort of become an Underland itself. If you've read Maximum Ride; this takes place after Fang: A Maximum Ride Novel. If you've played Tales of Symphonia; this takes place after Dawn of the New World. I'm going to try to make it so if you're into one of the fandoms you can follow this story. The next chapter is going to sort of explain Fang from Zelos's point of view and what not. But things you need to know to understand this first chapter are mostly about Fang. Fang is 17 years old and is commonly the second in command of the Flock (a group of bird-hybrid teenagers that were experimented on from infancy onward). He is able to virtually disappear(sort of like the Cheshire Cat) but, if he stays perfectly still he can also walk while still invisible if he breathes very slowly and is the same speed with everything in his body (like heartbeat,etc.) and is described as a strong and silent person. He is also able to breathe underwater. He's no longer with his flock and has begun wandering the Earth. This first chapter takes place in the woods of Canada during the summertime. The only thing you might want to note if you're not in the Tales of Symphonia fandom is that Zelos used to be a very high-up noble and aristocrat. Not too mention a member of a well respected group of heroes. NOW ON WITH THE STORY!

* * *

Staring across the cell over at the man he shared the jail with, Fang was seriously regretting jumping into that stupid hole. Who did he think he was? Alice in Wonderland? What a laugh. He knew better then to just aimlessly run into holes. And for what? A rustle that could have very well been a squirrel? He felt like an idiot.

He had been walking in the woods, his wings spread out nice and wide to stretch out the muscles. Occasionally he had to put them tight against his back to maneuver through the trees but he didn't mind. It was quiet out here. He liked it. For once, he had quiet. It was heavenly.

Fang lifted his head and froze- that noise. That damned noise that would cause all the confusion later. He heard the rustle of scampering tiny feet and he turned to see a bush near a large oak tree move as something dove into the hole. His stomach growled loudly. If it _was _a rabbit, it'd be a welcomed meal right about now. So he stealthily advanced along until he was right by the tree.

Leaning down he gazed down into the dark hole but he saw nothing. He heard nothing. Maybe the rodent had run past this point. He scowled and, just for all his trouble, leaned in more. "If you are in here-- there's no way you'll get out now," the seventeen year old growled as his last body part, his feet, entered into the hole that was larger than he had initially thought.

His wings tucked tightly against his back so he didn't rub against the bark and he reached out more to touch the bottom of the hole. That's when he'd started falling.

Mistake number one: Leaning into that stupid hole.

Falling was never a sensation he was used to, being a freaky bird kid and what-not. But he toppled over himself in numerous summersaults down the tunnel. At one point, just out of disparity, he whipped his wings out. It may have been a long hole but it definitely wasn't a wide hole because his wings slammed into the sides causing him to cry out in pain before letting out a line of obscenities.

Great, now he was dizzy _and_ hurt. Fantastic. Oh, and apparently he was going to end up in China because the painful slam to the ground just wasn't coming and there was no way any normal hole could be _this _deep.

Then he felt his body slow down. Well, that was different. He slowly began to pull his wings out, hoping to parachute to the ground now. Looking down he could see ground.

_Thank God._

With a quick _plop-plop _of his feet, he was finally grounded. Fang looked around the hole with his eyebrows pulled together in a tight line of confusion.

"What the Hell?"

The area around him was barren, a landscape like a burned down battle ground. Something bad had happened here, that was for sure. His expression softened when he saw corpses litter the smoldering field. Yeah, something _really _bad had happened here.

Investigating the area further from his current position he could see a door randomly placed in the field. It was unbelievably prestigious looking which confused Fang even _more_. It looked like the doorknob was made of gold. What the hell? Did that mean there used to be a building there? Walking closer he realized there was no previous building placed around the door. There was no signs of foundation or anything else.

Nope.

Just a random door.

Totally normal, right?

The avian-hybrid's gaze looked around time and time again at the perimeter. There was nobody here but the dead. So, what's the worse that could happen?

Fang scoffed at himself. There were a lot of things that could happen that were worse than tea-time with a bunch of rotting dead soldiers.

His hand outstretched and he wrapped his fingers slowly around the doorknob, just to be careful. With a swift motion he opened it and peered inside the world he had just opened.

Beautiful. That was one word he could use for it. Peaceful and beautiful. A garden of unbelievable proportions. He could see roses blooming on the bushes and a large mansion in the background. The grass was the perfect shade of green and the trees were trimmed just right. He saw a topiary in the shape of a fish (not the animal he would of picked but he was _sort _of biased towards birds so who was he to criticize?) and decided that the garden was better in every way than the battle field he was on currently.

So Fang took a step inside.

Mistake number two: Assuming the stupid garden was safe.

Stepping inside, the door shut behind him with a curt _pop! _and he jumped, turning to try to open the door again only to see the door had disappeared.

Crap.

He turned his attention back in front of him now (what other choice did he have?) and realized the garden wasn't like he had seen it through the doorway. It was dead, just like the soldiers on the battle field. Fang slowly walked over to a rose bush and lifted a bud into his hands to examine the demise of the beauty close-up. His head lifted and he looked around with his lips pursed. This was not a good place to be, he could feel it in his gut.

That's when a large medieval appearing knight pressed a dagger into his back. "What are you doing in forbidden territory?" he growled.

"I have no idea," Fang replied, turning around to knock this knight out. He hadn't really been expecting the knight to stab him with a needle in the neck.

Mistake number three: underestimating the technology of somebody just because they dress in stupid chain mail.

He'd woken up in this cell. This disgusting, claustrophobic, jail cell. It was dark but that didn't change the fact that he could see he had company. Across from him, leaning against the wall was a person. He said person because he couldn't differentiate the sex of this individual with long curly red hair who was clothed in what appeared to be an unusual amount of pink.

In the dim lighting Fang could see that this person was watching him with cerulean eyes. They were freakishly bright, he'd never seen anything like it before. Fang wasn't on Earth anymore, he could just tell.

"Good morning," it was a man. He had a masculine sort of tenor voice. Peculiar to say the least when compared to his feminine clothing and appearance. Cocking his head, the man sent a crooked smile his way. Fang's eyes had adjusted so he could see now that this man was unbelievably dirty. He must've been there for a long time. Either that or at some point rolled around on the filthy ground for entertainment.

"Good isn't the word I'd use," Fang dryly replied as he sat up in the cell in slight pain.

"What would you use?" the man with no defining age inquired, his eyebrows scrunching together as he awaited an answer.

"Shitty."

The man let out a rich laugh, "Shitty is the understatement of the YEAR, kid."

Fang scowled at the tone. "Don't call me 'kid'. You aren't that old… I don't think."

"I'm older than you," the man replied, lifting his head as he pressed against the wall and he shut his eyes. "What's your name, kid?"

"Fang. Not kid, it's Fang."

"Well, _that's_ not a very normal name."

"That's not very normal hair."

"Oh, touché, Fang," he let out a warm chuckle. Not something Fang could manage to do while in the nasty prison.

Fang watched the man for a moment longer before he found himself asking, "What's your name?"

His bright blue eyes reopened and he looked over at Fang, "Zelos," he held his hand out to Fang to shake, "The Great Magnificent Zelos Wilder, for long," he grinned at him.

Fang decided not to shake his hand after the second part of the introduction was spoken.

"Ouch, my pride," Zelos moaned, leaning back and pretending to faint against the filthy cell walls.

"Zelos…" Fang didn't quite like the way the name felt on his tongue but continued despite himself, "Where are we?"

"Prison," Zelos curtly responded without much thought.

"No shit. I meant… This place. This… _world_."

Zelos laughed perkily and clapped his hands together as he leaned forward in an excitable fashion, "Funny you should ask that. This place has had many _many _names and under all of them it's been completely different!"

"What's the name of it _now_?" Fang asked, not sure if he wanted the answer.

"Welcome to Hell, Kid."


	2. An Uneasy Alliance

**Author's Notes**: I was afraid nobody would read such an obscure cross-over, but seeing as how I've got at least one reader I decided to continue like I said I would! I would love feedback on this, this is my first-time writing as Fang and I'm hoping I've got him in good character. Thanks and here's the new installment of Fang in Wonderland!

* * *

From the lack of appreciation on Fang's face at his answer; Zelos assumed that the ominous reply wasn't being fondly thought of on the bird-kid's side of the room.

"Hell?" Fang practically snarled.

"You're not a very nice person," Zelos decided, leaning back calmly against the wall on his side of the dirty cell. "I mean, you're so young too. What a shame. You've already been beaten down by society-"

"Hell is not the name of this place," Fang decided.

"You don't know that," came Zelos's stubborn reply. "This could very well be Hell. I mean, look how red my hair is," he pointed a gloved finger at his head and gave Fang a 'HAH' expression. "It could be from all the hell-fire."

"What is the name of your world, Zelos?" the teenager insisted dryly.

"My world is Tethe'alla. Their world is Sylvarant. They don't get along so when those worlds combined, bad stuff went down." Zelos was waiting for it. He had his eyes on Fang as he pulled one knee up to rest his arm on. It was taking the avian-hybrid a little while. How long would it take before the reply came-

"Excuse me? Combined worlds?" Fang was staring at Zelos like he was high.

Zelos just managed to bark a little abrupt laugh of pleasure, "About time! I was worried for your sanity when you got quiet for so long!" he grinned a beaming smile over at Fang who did not seem so amused.

"Your world… is combined with another world… making this world?" Fang had to bite his tongue from saying it was ludicrous. He knew better than to rule out impossibilities; I mean, he had _wings_.

"Yeah, kid. The worlds were combined. Two groups of people got together. One sophisticated, that would naturally be the world I'm from, and one barbaric, that's Sylvarant. Tethe'alla is sort of where you are now. The capital to be exact; that's Meltokio."

"Do I get a map?" Fang grumbled under his breath sarcastically, not expecting Zelos to hear.

"Do you need one?" came Zelos's curious response, "You plan on blowing this popsicle stand, kid?"

"My name's not 'kid' and yeah, I plan on getting the hell out of here," Fang growled. "I'd ask you for help but you wouldn't be here if you could get out."

"Oh, on the contrary, I'm here because this place is far safer than anywhere on the outside for me," Zelos's tone had lost the earlier traces of humor.

"Huh?" came Fang's graceful teenage response.

"There's a war going on and I'm not going to be the next statistic on the 'famous person body count' list."

"Famous person?"

"You don't have enough time to hear that story," Zelos was smiling again. "So you want out, huh?"

"_YES_," Fang groaned loudly.

Zelos stood up, brushing off his white pants and striding over to the bars of the cell. He bent the bars without much effort and then snapped them from their place. "Go along, little chickadee, you're freeeeeee," Zelos said in a sort of bored sing-song tone to the Earthling who just gawked at him.

"What?" Zelos cocked his head with an innocent look.

"Dude. You just… What the hell?" Fang held his head in confusion.

"Simpleton," Zelos rolled his eyes, walking over and beginning to push the tall individual out of the cell to the door he had created. "Chip chop chip, kid, you've got things to do!"

Fang turned around though, "I think…" his voice trailed as he took in the appearance of the shorter man who was staring up at him with intelligent blue eyes. In his mind he was trying to figure out who Zelos's parallel was in the Alice in Wonderland story. It was either the Mad Hatter or the Cheshire Cat. He was either insane or insane and not able to be trusted…

Then Fang mentally face-palmed himself for really comparing this to Alice in Wonderland. This was reality for him right now and it didn't do him any good to look at a children's book for guidance. Zelos was comparable only to Zelos right now. He had to make the judgment call on what little he knew about the red-head. What he knew was that Zelos knew a lot more than he did and had the skills to prove he could live through this journey-

"Stop staring at me and finish your question. I'm not _that_ gorgeous."

Fang blinked, "Oh. Yeah. Sorry. Just thinking."

"Think out loud then. There's a perfectly working hole in the cell for you to walk through and you're just staring at me like I'm a six headed dragon," Zelos scowled. "And I've seen one and I will tell you that the people I saw it with shared that exact expression," he added as though Fang had a hard time believing Zelos's story after the things he had seen so far.

"I need help getting back home. I don't know this place like you do."

Well, that was admittance to incompetence if Zelos had ever heard it.

The red-head watched the teenager's expression stay confident yet meek. The bird-kid definitely didn't want his help but he knew he needed it. At least he was sharp. Zelos had been willing to let him walk out to his doom before he had proved he was half-way intelligent.

"Is that a request for an escort?" Zelos tauntingly inquired with a catty smile.

"Yes."

"I'm flattered," Zelos half-way giggled before he walked out through the hole and over to an abandoned looking table where he grabbed a sword and shield.

"What's that?" Fang asked.

"My accessories. Gotta complement my looks somehow when I'm covered with all this dirt," came Zelos's richly sarcastic response.

"You're kind of an asshole, Zelos."

"Thanks, kid, you're not too shabby yourself," the Tethe'allan snatched a flask out of a drawer and opened it, taking a swig of whatever liquor was left inside by it's previous owner.

"Ew, that wasn't yours… Why would you drink from that? Who knows how long that's been there," Fang scowled in disgust.

"You're gonna wish you got buzzed when we get away from this prison," Zelos laughed lightly, "Life's just a little too real for me right now. I needed that."

"How long were you in that cell, Zelos?"

"Not long enough."

Those vague answers were making Fang uneasy but he nodded.

"Let's get a move on, kid. We've got lots of ground to cover and not enough sanity to get it done."

"Next thing you're gonna say is that everybody is mad here," Fang scoffed at his own little joke.

"Of course they are. They killed all the people sane enough to fight back."

And with that, Zelos began to stride down the hallway to the exit of the prison. Fang stared after him for a long time before sighing and jogging to catch up.

_This will be interesting,_ the two thought to themselves.


	3. Escape From Your Past

**Author's Notes**: This story is pretty easy for me to crank out. Expect consistent updating!

* * *

"You said you were famous?" Fang asked as he walked behind Zelos who was lightly jogging up the stair case out of the prison.

"Can we talk about this later? Being stealthy is a bitch while having a lengthy conversation," the Tethe'allan snapped and he opened the door at the top of the staircase.

Fang frowned but nodded. The first time he had questions to ask and things to say and he wasn't allowed to talk. Was this how Nudge felt when she got told to shut up? He hoped not, it kind of hurt.

Zelos poked his head out slightly from the door and light finally fell upon his dirty features. Fang was in shock, he hadn't noticed how absolutely filthy the redhead had been until he had been lighted by the luminance. The once-warrior was an absolute mess.

"C'mon, we've got lots of ground to cover," Zelos's words brought Fang back to reality and he dumbly nodded. Would that have been him if Zelos hadn't been able to get him out? A filthy relic of society just rotting away in some cell? Fang decided to shake his head and not dwell on it.

The two sneaked out of the prison's entrance and Fang looked around in confusion. They were in a large prestigious castle. Definitely a contrast to the darkness of where they had met.

"Wipe that stupid look off your face. The only thing royal about this castle anymore is the carpeting," Zelos hissed and he grabbed Fang's arm forcefully and he began jogging, somehow silently, along.

"Wait."

Zelos yanked Fang to an abandoned hallway and Fang's order and he glared up at him, "Wait for what?" Zelos snarled uneasily. Obviously he had met Zelos in prison for a reason. They were both now official fugitives. The blue-eyed swordsman in front of him just knew to be afraid.

For some reason, Fang wasn't too frightened.

The confusion settled in on Zelos's face, "I know you don't get it now but this place is _not _safe. I'll explain it to you but we need to get out now so I can live to tell that tale, Fang."

"I can become invisible," Fang blurted.

"So can my imaginary friend Bernie but he only does it because he's shy."

For some reason, that reply didn't strike Fang as the type somebody would give if they were convinced or sincere.

"You take the lead and don't worry about me. I'll get along just fine, Zelos," Fang gave a half-hearted attempt at a warm smile to soothe the borderline hysterical guide he had adopted.

Zelos scowled, "It's your funeral," and he proceeded on his stealthy escape.

Fang watched as Zelos began to slink around corners and he shut his eyes for a long moment to steady his breathing. Then he began walking once his heartbeat was nice and steady. Nobody saw the bird kid anymore. He was invisible.

Being unseen was a wonderful feeling, Fang would never get tired of disappearing.

His eyes opened and he began following Zelos and he noted how the redhead would sometimes jerk behind a corner and clench the fabric of his long duster on his pink vest. He'd shut his bright cerulean eyes and he held the duster a little closer like a self-conscious child did with their favorite blanket. And this proved to become a system for Fang that he used when he needed to press against the wall tightly to get out of the way because Zelos never failed to do this before somebody walked down the hallway. Normally the person was heavily armed; like, oh say, a medieval knight.

Zelos did the jerk behind the closest hallway's corner and he grabbed the edge of his duster with ripped gloves. His eyes shut tightly and he steadied his breathing to stay silent. A few moments passed, but nobody had come this time.

Fang watched Zelos for the go but he didn't move, just kept his eyes closed with his back pressed into the wall. He took this as a sign to press tighter against the wall and not to relax. Where were the people the redhead was waiting for?

"Neither the chosen nor the bird kid are in the cell any longer, King Irving," a knight said in a perfect subordinate fashion.

"Well, go find them!" a man, not much older than Fang but not much younger than Zelos snapped. He was clothed in red. Was this the equivalent of the Queen of Hearts?

Okay, he needed to stop this comparison of Alice thing. It was getting sad.

He turned his gaze back to Zelos, he was the one who was in danger of being seen, after all.

Zelos's eyes were still shut tightly, his hands clenching the long pink duster even tighter and his breaths a little shaky. Fang's expression softened. The redhead was terrified, and the avian-hybrid honestly felt bad for dragging him along on this journey.

King Irving had brown hair and dark eyes to match. He stayed put for a long time and Fang held his breath.

_Please don't turn that corner. Please don't see Zelos. Please don't kill my only way home._

King Irving definitely didn't come off too threatening. His spikey boyish hair and young features didn't portray danger to Fang. The King brushed back his long red cape to reveal two swords. "Zelooos? You out there, 'bud'?"

Fang's eyes were back on Zelos who physically winced at the nickname. If he lived through this, Fang was going to make Zelos tell him about King Irving and his relationship with Zelos.

"I think we should talk about this. How would you like that? A good hear-to-heart talk. Just like the old days," King Irving was smiling crookedly and he stepped closer to the corner where Zelos was standing stoically. His eyes were shut even tighter and his fist wrapped more around his duster.

"Is this about Sheena?" Irving now scoffed, "Come on. You know I didn't _mean_ to kill her-"

Zelos couldn't stand it any longer and he took off running for the exit. Fang quickly let his cover get blown and ran after Zelos, his heart racing as King Irving could be heard running after them.

"Get back here, Zelos!"

"Run! Run, Fang!" Zelos was breathing heavily but his eyes were directed ahead. He couldn't look behind him. Not at the King. The Chosen of Tethe'alla couldn't do that. So he kept running, almost leaving Fang in the dust but not quite.

"He's catching up!" Fang yelled, barely on Zelos's tail now.

Zelos grabbed Fang by the forearm right as they reached the outside of the castle a pair of bright orange translucent wings appeared on the dirty fugitives back and he took off into the air with Fang who quickly got his wings spread out and began to fly. All while staring in shock at the orange feathered wings that were keeping Zelos in the air.

"You have wings?" Fang asked, befuddled more than he could even voice in anything more than just his tone.

"Yeah," Zelos's distracted response came as he hovered above the gates of the ruined city, his eyes were on the doors of the castle where King Irving stood.

"Zelos, who is that guy?" the teenager asked softly now.

"Nobody important," Zelos met his eyes.

"He seems pretty damn important."

"Can we just a move on? I don't want to talk about this with you while hovering over the city. Somebody's going to find a bow and arrow and shoot us down and I don't want to become the prized goose at dinner," the Chosen's tone was bitter.

"He said you were a 'Chosen'. Chosen for what?"

"Nothing. That's the most horrible fucking part, Fang, I was _chosen_ to become _nothing_." Zelos's words were frigid and he turned his body, taking off and away from the city and Fang pursued.

Zelos knew a lot more than Fang bargained for. Maybe the most out of anybody he could have picked. Perhaps luck had nothing to do with his meeting Zelos. Maybe it was fate to help this man with his demons and save this world.

Or maybe this was a dream.

'_Ooooh, please be a dream,' _Fang hoped inwardly as he followed the dirty redhead across the dead fields away from the run down capitol.


	4. King What? Oh Dear, How Dirty

**Author's Notes**: Damn, this one was hard. I really hate explaining things through characters. It seems staged to me. Now watch as Fang pries information from Zelos's hostile pale fingers! :D Oh, and I'm pretty sure I'm turning Fang into Lloyd? Uhm, help?

* * *

Fang wasn't surprised when Zelos finally landed beside a running stream. He'd been that dirty before and he knew that getting clean of the funk was a gratifying experience. The redhead plopped to the ground with the grace of a swan (which was odd considering how much strength he seemed to hold- Fang would have assumed that'd cripple the Chosen's agility) and Zelos's orange wings disappeared now.

"You have wings?" Fang asked.

"Yeah," Zelos replied as he began stripping off his vest and gloves now along with his smudged-with-dirt headband. "I have wings."

"How… How do you have wings?"

Zelos looked over at Fang for the first time since they'd left Meltokio and smirked, "Is that so far-fetched to you, kid?" he motioned with a pale hand to Fang's wings.

The teenager became flustered, "Well, I know how I got mine! I want to know if it's anything like how you got yours," he huffed.

"Do my wings look like yours in any way/shape or form?" Zelos knelt down beside the stream and started to wash his face with the cool water.

Fang was silent for a long moment, "No. Not really, no."

"Then what makes you think I got mine in any way similar to how you got yours when we're from totally separate worlds, hmmm?" those bright insightful (yet always able to piss Fang off) blue eyes turned from the water to Fang.

Silence from the bird-kid.

"That's kinda what I thought."

"King Irving was sort of a dick," Fang blurted out gracefully.

Zelos suddenly laughed and he grinned, shaking his head at Fang's words. "Really? Most people _love_ him."

"He came off sort of like a psychopath to me. Those aren't my type when it comes to people I care for."

"That man… That _dick_ is the reason I've been in prison for six months."

"You said you wanted to be in prison though," Fang's eyebrows scrunched together as he took a seat beside the river and began washing off his hands and face as well as he could while still giving Zelos his full attention. He had a feeling he'd need it if Zelos was going to explain anything to him.

"I did. I wanted to be in prison _because_ of the king," Zelos leaned down and dunked his head fully under the water and whipped it back up in a quick fashion that ended up splashing Fang quite a lot. (_I mean, Zelos's hair was freaksihly long. Even for a woman that'd be long..._)

"Hey! Watch it!" Fang scowled.

"Oh please, you needed the shower," Zelos rolled his eyes and continued cleaning his hair. Seemed like hygiene had been a much-loved thing the Tethe'allan had sacrificed to stay safe in that cell.

Fang thought for a moment and finally decided to pursue it, "You told me you'd explain everything."

"I did, didn't I?" Zelos's tone was sarcastic, which meant that he probably didn't want to carry through with that promise.

"Tell me what happened here, Zelos."

The once upon a time noble turned and looked at Fang for a long time as he debated in his head whether or not he should tell Fang the truth. The teenager gazed back patiently with a slight purse of his lips. "Zelos… Come on." Okay, maybe not so patient.

"I'm twenty seven years old, Fang."

"Huh?" Fang blinked.

"When I was twenty-two a group of people came into Meltokio. They were the group of regeneration and they had come from Sylvarant to bond their world together with Tethe'alla. All while helping their friend, Colette, who was the chosen of Sylvarant."

"Chosen… That dick-guy-"

"King Irving," came Zelos's correction.

"Yeah, he called you that. What's a chosen?"

"A chosen is…" Zelos sighed as his hand reached up to the gem embedded on his chest. "Is the name of the savior of both worlds; Sylvarant and Tethe'alla. It's a big deal in both worlds. Back then, when that group came to me, I was second in power to the king."

Fang blinked, "King Irving?"

"No, a previous ruler. He died due to 'old age'. His daughter was supposed to take over the throne. Obviously, though, that never happened," Zelos cleared up the confusion in a simple tone.

"The chosen is supposed to be a descendent of angels. They're used as a carrier for the Goddess Martel. A sacrifice."

"Were you a sacrifice?" Fang asked.

"No. Colette was. Sylvarant and Tethe'alla shared a mana link-"

"Mana?"

Zelos stared at Fang for a long time. "I don't know where you're from but it's sounding more bumpkin-y than Sylvarant to me."

"What's mana?" Fang growled to hide his embarrassment.

"Mana is the world's _life source_," Zelos duh'd to him. "You can imagine how two worlds sharing one life source might result in some off balance occurrences when it comes to resources."

"Sure, one could be flourishing and one could be sort of run down, right?" Fang said.

"Exactly. Sylvarant was run down. Colette was their sacrifice. If she succeeded on her journey to regenerate Sylvarant? The mana balance would shift and Sylvarant would flourish while Tethe'alla became rundown."

"So you were more of a symbol than a sacrifice?" Fang asked, "Cause Tethe'alla wouldn't really _need_ you if you think about it."

"Yeah, don't remind me," Zelos mumbled. "The chosen dies on that journey though. Lloyd Irving, the leader of the group who came to see me, wanted to stop Colette from being sacrificed. In short, I helped him and we joined the two worlds together."

"Uhuh, that makes sense-" Fang cut himself off and his eyes widened, "Irving…"

"Yeah. King Irving and Lloyd Irving," Zelos's tone was dry.

"So Lloyd turned on you guys?"

"That's not Lloyd."

The adamant tone made Fang think twice before replying.

"Then who is he?"

"That man is a parasite parading around as my friend. He is not Lloyd. Lloyd died along with Sheena a long time ago."

Fang frowned and a silence entered between the two.

"Sheena was my fiancé," Zelos could say before the question even left Fang's mouth.

The teenager's face fell, "What about the others from that group? They helped save the world before…"

"Anybody who isn't officially dead is a fraud, Fang."

"Oh…" came his oh-so intelligent response. "That really sucks, Zelos."

Zelos smirked, "Yeah, it really does."

"So this guy took over Lloyd and took power after the king died?"

"Yeah, it wasn't hard, I can tell you that. The world already worshiped the ground Lloyd walked on. He saved everybody, y'know?" Zelos's voice was fond when he spoke of the original Lloyd Irving. "When somebody that looked like him came around and started barking orders? Princess Hilda didn't stand a chance. She was just a rich little royal blooded woman to these people. She disappeared not long after Irving became king."

"Why haven't they cloned or killed you?" Fang couldn't help but feel like he had found a misfit toy. Something was wrong with Zelos if he was in such a famous group and in such high power before being in that group yet he hadn't been disposed of.

"The King made his opinion of me made clear when he killed Sheena. I went to prison to stay out of the way. The people aren't influenced by my status anymore. Killing me would be a waste of time. I'm just an ex-chosen," then Zelos laughed.

"What's so funny?" Fang asked in confusion.

"I guess now I'm a convict too on _top _of being worthless to the evil regime."

"I'd rather be wanted than following orders from King Dickhead."

Zelos began laughing again and Fang couldn't help but feel proud of his newly developing people skills. He'd cheered his guide out of the funk! Cool!

Maybe he'd get home faster now!


	5. What Are You, Fang?

Zelos was staring up at the sky in silence and Fang couldn't help but feel slightly irked by the quiet. His normally chatty companion hadn't said anything for a good hour; he had just stared up at the dark sky as the campfire that separated the two crackled and popped.

"It's different here, this world," Fang said, trying to perk Zelos up once more. Or at least get him talking.

Zelos's eyes seemed to focus in on reality and he glanced over at the teenager. "Hmm?"

"I said it's different here. I can't help but be reminded about a book whenever I think about everything here," Fang told him, stretching his legs out in front of him and crossing his ankles while he stared across the fire at the red-head.

"Is the book any good?" Zelos asked with a smirk.

"Some people could be accused of worshipping it," Fang replied.

Zelos chuckled, "That's good, I guess."

"Where do we go from here? I mean, I know you aren't really in much of a hurry to get moving but…" Fang's voice trailed, not really wanting to force anything on Zelos but at the same time he had a world of his own that wasn't in ruins that he'd like to return to.

Thankfully Zelos could read between the lines.

He lifted his hands up towards the sky and stretched his pale fingers out. Fang was watching from afar with slight confusion at the odd movement. The chosen still had a light smile on his face, "You want to go home. I don't blame you. This place is pretty fucked up right now."

"Yeah," Fang mildly agreed and he looked at the fire to avoid taking in anymore of that empty expression on Zelos's face.

"Are you a mutant or another species, Fang?" Zelos was still holding his hands up to the sky but now he was flexing his fingers to form a fist. He opened his palms up towards the moon again before closing his gloved fingers back into that tight fist.

"Huh?"

"Your wings. The way you reacted to mine shows that you're not used to others having them. So, where you given yours by experimentation? Was it a fluke in birth and you just got stuck with them? Or are you a species of bird-kid freak?"

"Don't call me a freak," Fang snarled.

Zelos blinked and he looked at Fang with an expression of reserved surprise, "I piss you off?" he smiled widely now.

"Yeah," the avian-hybrid growled.

"Well, clear up my curiosity and answer the question. Freak." He was taunting the teenager now.

Fang crossed his arms tightly over his chest and glared up at the sky now.

Silence re-entered the camp.

He would have to remember the next time he wanted to perk up Zelos that the redhead was kind of an asshole.

The teenager adjusted in slight pain, his wings still hurt from the day before when he'd whacked the bone on the side of the hole. God, that felt like forever ago. Fang found his hand reaching up and rubbing the sore part on his wing.

"When'd you hurt 'em?" Zelos asked in a bored tone.

"Before I got put in that cell with you," replied Fang in a not-so nice tone.

"No need to be a bitch," Zelos sat up and stretched. "Lemme see."

"See what?"

"Your brain because I'm about 100 percent positive there isn't one in that thick skull of yours considering how much I repeat myself around you. Your _wing_, kid, I'm going to heal it."

"Somehow I doubt you could," the olive-skinned male grumbled.

Zelos had waltzed around the fire and over to his side by now and he knelt down, "Lets get a look at that sucker," he took Fang's wing tenderly in one hand and stretched it out.

"You familiar with the anatomy of a bird-kid, Zelos?"

"Nope, I'm just _winging _it!" Zelos let loose a laugh of maniacal giggles, seeming to find his pun unbelievably entertaining. Well, at least somebody thought it was funny because it just managed to annoy Fang.

The giggles were calming down and Zelos ran his fingers over the feathers of the sore spot. "Heh, heh, I'm too much sometimes. Heh," he shook his head at his hilarious one-liner.

"It wasn't that funny."

"You are such a wet-blanket, man," Zelos sighed out like Fang had hurt his feelings. He leaned back and began to wave his hand around.

"First-aid!"

The feeling of euphoria that flooded Fang's senses made the bird-kid gasp in surprise. Healing had not brought the idea of actual 'healing' to his mind when Zelos had said it. He just assumed he'd get some bandages or something.

Not that, within seconds of the words 'first-aid' being spoke, that he'd actually be healed.

"That's so cool," Fang gasped.

"Mmmhmm," Zelos slapped his hand on the back of Fangs shoulder and gave him a tightly constricting hug/glomp. "I'm cool so everything I do is automatically cool, kid."

"I don't know about that," Fang shrugged the red-head off of him and gave him a firm expression of 'no more hugging'.

"You're so mean," Zelos resumed his position before he had healed Fang. He was back to lying on the other side of the fire with his eyes directed to the sky. "I don't know why I'm helping you out at all."

"Like you have anything better to do," Fang scoffed.

Zelos grew quiet for a second.

_Oh shit, that was insensitive to say._

Zelos grinned though and let out a laugh, "I guess you're right! What else could I do? Heh, you're smarter than I give you credit for. I take back what I said earlier! Heh hehheh."

Fang felt like the entire light-hearted statement had been completely insincere, but before he could say anything about it Zelos had stood up.

"I'm gonna go get us some grub. You sit tight, kid, I'll be back."

And Zelos disappeared into the woods, leaving Fang all alone by the crackling fire as silence once again fell into the camp.


	6. God, Make Sure There's No Jabberwocky

**Author's Notes**: I dish this out with apologies. It's short but it's a major game changer. I'm pleased to see this has more readers than I would have thought, considering the odd cross-over choice I made. Once I'm done, don't expect these two to disappear. I'll start writing one-shots. Summer is here so there should be more regular updating.

* * *

Zelos scowled to himself. Who did that kid think he was? 'Not like you have anything better to do.'

"Yeah, I have a lot of better things to do. I could be keeping my ass safe while you get gutted by King Fuckface," the red-head spat as he began to scope out the area for some food.

"Where does that twerp get off?" he hissed under his breath and then he spotted a rabbit. At least something was surviving out here.

He knelt slightly to get ready to pounce. His hand reached down and he was pulling at the hilt of his sword slowly. Zelos then jumped and beheaded the rabbit. Normally, he wasn't so brash with his movements but he didn't care right now. Fang was grating on his nerves.

"Stupid teenager," he stood up completely before striding over to the rabbit's corpse and he picked up his future-dinner by it's hind-legs, making sure he didn't get any blood on his already-rough-enough looking outfit.

Last thing he needed was more blood on his hands, after all.

The awakening from his zoned out train of thought was not exactly pleasant; the salty stank of blood wasn't what he wanted to wake up to. He looked up from his shoes a few inches in front of him at the headless rabbit on the ground.

_Headless _rabbit.

Zelos did wear an unusual amount of pink. Pink like a _heart_.

"Why'd you cut off the head?" Fang inquired.

"To kill it. You can't very well eat something that's alive, kid," Zelos scoffed as he grabbed a stick and began to scrape off the bark so it would have a sharpened point. Then he stabbed the rabbit all the way through with the stick before putting it over the fire.

Fang's stomach loudly roared.

"You don't seem to be complaining, anyway," Zelos smiled at him cockily.

"You're an asshole."

"Say it again and I'll plaster that saying on a mug and make you drink everything out of it because it's starting to become your catch-phrase, kid."

"Maybe you should be nicer."

"I think I'm a perfectly pleasant person, seeing as how I'm helping you out and I'm in no way obligated to you."

The words were cold and off-putting. Fang glared at him but looked back at the fire now.

"You're not going to skin it first?" he asked Zelos as he looked at fire.

"No, I'm too hungry and I don't give a shit anymore, Fang."

"Did I do something wrong earlier?" the teenager demanded.

"No," Zelos simply replied, not adding more to the sentence.

"Cause you're acting like I did something wrong, and if I didn't I don't know why you're acting like that."

"You talk a lot."

"Not normally but I don't fucking understand you."

"Hrm. That sucks."

"Zelos, did I do something _wrong_?"

"Do you understand how much I'm risking by being your stupid chaperone, kid?" Zelos's words were tight and curt.

Fang looked at him dumbly. It seemed like he didn't understand.

"My _life_. That's what I'm risking. Do you care?"

Silence.

"I didn't think so," Zelos scoffed, shaking his head at Fang's selfish youthful train of thought.

"I… I just want to get home, Zelos," Fang said gently, his eyebrows pulled together softly as he looked at the redhead who was holding the rabbit corpse over the fire.

"I do too, but I don't have the convenience of doing that anymore."

Fang looked at his shoes like they were the most interesting thing in the small campsite while he thought to himself. The words that came out of his mouth next surprised even himself.

"I'll help you defeat King Dickhead."

Zelos's head whipped up so he could stare at Fang incredulously. "I beg your pardon?"

"I'm going to help you defeat that King guy," Fang repeated with more confidence.

"Uhuh. How do you s'pose you're gonna do that, kid?" Zelos reared his head slightly and stared down his nose at Fang.

The teenager stared at the corpse of the rabbit for a moment before looking across the fire at Zelos.

"We'll behead him."

Zelos laughed and clapped his hands together, "Now you're talking, kid!"

Fang smiled awkwardly, wondering inwardly what he had just volunteered himself for. Hopefully there was no Jabberwocky in this world.

"So, the first thing we've got to do is kill his pet dragon," Zelos informed Fang as he baked the rabbit.

To which the avian-hybrid groaned and lowered his head into his hands before saying, "Oh, that's fucking _fantastic._"

Zelos just laughed at his misfortune.


	7. My Name is FANG

**Author's Notes**: The router for my computer is out so I'm sitting in the library trying to get ahold of the wireless. As I write this, I can't get ahold of any wireless connections. So, while I wait for my mom to get finished with her work, I decided to let my laptop charge and type out another chapter of Fang in Wonderland. I got the Alice in Wonderland DVD for my birthday so I was hit by inspiration once more. We're about halfway through with this story, I'd venture to say. So expect about 8 more chapters, I think. This story has gotten a nice following so I'm pretty proud of that. There's a lot of dialogue in this chapter, so if that's not your cup of tea I apologize.

* * *

"So, a dragon huh? That's… That's a really clichéd evil-guy pet to have, don't you think?" Fang looked up at Zelos from his position on the ground. The redhead was standing up and stretching his legs after their nutritious dinner of headless rabbit.

"I don't get a say in his antics. If I did, his name would actually be King Dickhead and he wouldn't be parading around with the face of my once upon a best friend," Zelos scowled.

"… Is it a big dragon?" Fang found his voice sounded a little too meek for it's own good.

"Oh, it's a fucking beast," Zelos laughed.

"That's just great," the teenager groaned, burying his head into his knees.

"You volunteered to help me, kid. Helping me consists in slaying a dragon and regaining power of a once mighty kingdom. Sorry it couldn't have been more simple; like, borrowing a cup of sugar," the chosen one sneered.

Fang lifted his head and rested it atop of his dirty knees. "So… How do you go about killing a dragon?"

"Stab it a couple hundred times, I'd venture to say," Zelos shrugged.

"Well, that simplifies things," came the sarcastic teenagers reply.

"Hey, you volunteered."

"Stop reminding me," Fang stood up now. "Can we get moving? I want to get this over with."

"Sure thing," the redhead piped, "First thing's first. We gotta get you a sword!"

Fang blinked, "… Why?"

"You can't kick the damn beast into submission with a pair of Keds," Zelos scowled, looking down his nose at Fang's sneaker, "You need to stab it. Stabbing is done with a sword. Or a spoon if you've got real dedication."

"How do you know these are called Keds?" was the only response Fang could come up with.

"Cause it's plastered on the side of your shoe," Zelos scoffed at him.

"Oh."

Zelos stretched out like a lazy house cat. "'Oh' is very correct, my good ward."

"Don't call me a ward," Fang scowled.

"Get up get up get uuuup!" Zelos began pushing at Fang obnoxiously. He grabbed him by the shoulders and began tugging at the teenager repeatedly.

"Ugh, fine! Fine! I'm up!" Fang stood now, letting his wings spread and the feathers ruffle.

"That simplifies things immensely. I say that with absolutely no sarcasm too," Zelos informed him, looking the wings over with a calculating look.

"We're going to fly, then? To wherever we have to go to get this sword?" Fang blinked.

"Sure as hell beats walking. Besides, the only people in the court of King Dickhead that can fly is his pigheaded dragon. We fly, we eliminate most odds of running into enemies," the redhead crossed his arms over his chest now as he explained the situation to the avian-hybrid that towered above him.

Fang made a face to which Zelos replied to with his very own sneer, "What are you grimacing about, kid?"

"If we run into the dragon while we're in the air?" Fang inquired.

"Then I hope you're a fast flyer."

"Oh that's strangely not reassuring in any way, shape, or form," the teenager scowled.

"We bicker a lot."

"Huh?"

Fang stared down at Zelos in confusion of the obvious, yet sudden, observation.

Zelos shrugged, "I mean, we argue a TON. That's not normal, seeing as how we're on the same team and all. We're helping each other too. We should unbicker."

"Unbicker isn't a word."

"What did I just say, kid? We're stopping our bickering as of NOW," he accompanied his firm declaration with a poke to Fang's nose.

"Because it's really _that_ simple," Fang rolled his eyes.

"It really really really is, my dear ward."

"Why am I always a ward or a kid? My name is Fang. Not Kid or dear ward," Fang groaned.

"Your constant complaining is the reason for our bickering," Zelos decided. "So stop being a whiney bitch."

"I'm not a whiney bitch!" Fang exclaimed childishly. Zelos just did not bring out his nicest, more mature, personality traits.

"See, that's just the sort of thing a defiant whiney bitch would say to somebody who informed them that they are, in fact, a whiney bitch," The redhead smirked.

"You are absolutely hopeless," Fang scowled.

"Uhuh. So, you know anything about swords, Whiney Bitch?" Zelos frankly inquired.

"Oh my God, is that my new nickname?" Fang stared at him in shock.

"It will be if you keep this attitude up. W.B., do answer my question now if you will," the redhead smiled up at him with a sugary grin.

"No. I don't have any experience with swords. I fight hand to hand," Fang answered angrily.

Zelos made a face, "That sucks. That means I have to train you too. Ugh. Of all the heroes of the journey of regeneration you got stuck with me. Why'd you have to get stuck with me?" he dramatically sighed.

"Last I heard, you were the last hero left," Fang grumbled.

"Oh yeah. I outlived everybody, didn't I?" Zelos then began to laugh.

'_That's unnerving to say the least. I'm being led around by a lunatic,'_ Fang thought to himself as Zelos's wings sprouted from his back in an orange flurry of sparkles and colors. "You look like a fairy," Fang found himself informing Zelos bitterly.

"At least I'm not a whiney bitch," Zelos chimed as he took off into the air.


	8. My Name is ZELOS

**Author's Notes**: Here's a nice big fat chapter filled with wonderful details and great plot-forwarding abilities. OFF TO PALMACOSTA TO GET FANG A SWORD! Hoorah! Enjoy. There's not a lot I can add to these notes that even matter except this is the only story I have other than one Tales of Symphonia Sheelos fic I have that require updating so I'll be working on this more. Although, I may have to up the rating on this if Fang keeps his dirty mouth the way it is… however, Zelos is pretty much egging him on.

* * *

Fang followed behind Zelos in a close pursuit for quite a while. It was a nice view of the world, but the scenery was only barren land from the battles. The only change of subject from the barren battlefields were the ones filled with rotting corpses. Fang was figuring out very fast he preferred the ones with no people than the ones with dead people. The flight was pretty silent, but occasionally Zelos would slow his pace so he was flying beside Fang and he would point to something and give a brief history lesson.

Zelos was at his side currently and he pointed to what looked like an abandoned village. "That was Mizuho, a village of ninjas," he lectured lightly.

"Ninjas?" Fang cocked his head, looking at the shacks below them.

"Yeah. The village was hidden from view for a long time. Only a select group of people knew how to get in and out. They were destroyed first in the war," Zelos sighed, "It makes sense though. If you want to take over, you need to take out those most likely to catch on and fight back first."

Fang frowned as he looked at Zelos. The red-head sped up again to take the lead and the teenager sighed and followed suit.

It was tiresome and tedious as they flew across the changing, but always emptied of its living populace, cities and landscapes. Finally Zelos began to bring down his elevation and he landed outside a sea-side city. It was quite large and didn't look completely deserted- as of yet. That obviously was always up for change.

Zelos's boots padded onto the ground as he landed and he looked over his shoulder at Fang with those icy blue eyes and a mirthless smile. "We're here."

"What is the name of 'here'?" Fang asked as he tucked his wings up against his back, running a hand through his hair to get it messed up and out of its windblown look.

"Palmacosta," the Tethe'allan answered as he began digging around in his small travel bag that he wore in a loop around his belt. The coat-tails of his long vest always seemed to cover it and Fang hadn't even noticed the bag until they had taken flight and the wind had blown the red-head's clothes back enough to where, when Fang glanced at the dagger Zelos wore at his waist in a thick expensive sheath, he saw the small leather bag.

Zelos pulled a piece of clothing out and Fang's eyebrows scrunched together. "Is right now really the time for a wardrobe change?"

"Remember that talk about me being kind of famous?" Zelos questioned as he pulled his headband down to cover the bottom half of his face. He took the piece of white clothe he had taken from the bag and used it to tie his hair in a way that it was unseen and now Zelos's face was covered except for a slit where Fang could see those bright cerulean eyes and some strands of loose red hair that he hadn't tucked away sufficiently. "Ohh… So we're not attacked," Fang realized.

Zelos's eyes seemed to brighten and the clothe moved where his mouth was as his lips pulled apart into a smile, Fang assumed. "You're catching on." With one swift motion that made the back of his vest flow behind him like a cape, Zelos turned his back to Fang and began to walk into the gate for the city.

The avian-hybrid followed loyally. He looked around the city with a frown, seeing peasants lying in the streets' alleys. "Why are there so many poor people here?" Fang found himself asking Zelos under his breath.

"Because the taxes have gotten unbelievably high and Palmacosta is a shipping town. They're able to pay the high taxes and tariffs due to their flourishing economy," Zelos explained. "As the economy grows, so do the taxes. If the business goes down, though, the taxes plateau. It leads to an uneven distribution of money. The poor are only able to pay their bills… Nothing else. No money for food or shelter. Palmacosta is one of the last cities standing because of their money but… The people don't see any of the cash. It's all going to the King," he glanced over his shoulder at Fang. "In a way, they've just prolonged their misery. Once they've run out of people to trade and provide for they'll be finished just like all the other cities."

Fang opened his mouth to reply but he shut it, knowing that his input wouldn't change anything and he realized that Zelos didn't care to hear his opinion anyway. The Chosen had turned his head back in front of him and he walked over the bridges past the poor civilians towards the marketplace.

"I feel like I'm on my way to a cantina to meet Han Solo," Fang mumbled to himself.

"Who the fuck is Han Solo?" Zelos asked in an impatient tone.

"Uhm, it's nobody. Which store are we going to?" the teenager quickly covered.

"The one to get you dragon-slaying gear, kid," the masked swordsman said and he stopped walking when he reached the front of a small store. Zelos's blue eyes were peering over the counter at a fat older man who was sleeping on the job.

"I guess blacksmiths aren't on call here?" Fang asked, a sarcastic smile on his lips to betray the serious tone he had given his comment.

Zelos shot him a 'shut up' look before he leaned his hands over the counter. "Yo pops, wake up," he nudged the man who snorted in his sleep and rolled away slightly.

Fang found himself snickering at this blatant disregard for Zelos and the mage scowled. "The things I sacrifice when I don't use my celebrity," he mumbled to himself as he hopped over the counter and leaned down, nudging the man more.

The man did not wake.

Zelos turned his body 180 degrees without moving from his kneeling position. He looked around the fairly empty marketplace before looking up at Fang with eyes that were especially striking without any other features negating their brightness. "If anybody starts getting suspicious? Take them out and be quiet about it."

"Suspicious? What's there to be suspicious about?" Fang questioned with a cock of his head.

That's when Zelos drew his dagger and held it up to the old man's neck. The blacksmith wasn't a complete bum because he knew enough about his profession to recognize the sound of unsheathing metal.

His eyes widened quickly like a small child who was just surprised by what they suspected to be a monster under their bed when it's just the family dog. Zelos's gloved hand was over the man's mouth, so, when the man screamed, it was muffled.

"Shhhhh," Zelos lifted a finger to his covered mouth and the man began to relax from the initial shock.

The fright was being replaced by hostility. Zelos slowly removed his hand, "I need a sword, old man," he told him simply.

The blacksmith scowled, "My name is Whidmore," he informed Zelos.

"That's fantastic, Whidmore. Do you make swords, Whidmore?" the ex-noble cocked his head in mock innocence, "Because, Whidmore, if you do, Whidmore, I'd really like to have one, Whidmore."

"Can you pay?" Whidmore snarled.

"Does it fucking matter? Nobody can pay in this town. Somebody will just steal your money in two hours anyway. It's no good anymore, Whidmore," Zelos said the name like an insult. It almost made Fang glad he'd been dubbed 'Kid'.

"Do you have something other than gald to offer me, stranger?" Whidmore sat up and tugged at his ragged clothes and rubbed at his eyes.

"Freedom."

Whidmore's eyes widened and he looked at Zelos for a long moment. "Freedom?" he questioned.

"Freedom," Zelos repeated, slowly standing to his feet and he sheathed his sword now as he let the idea brew in Whidmore's brain.

Then Whidmore saw the gem on Zelos's chest that was half-covered by the white burqa he had appropriated for himself.

"You… You're one of the heroes of regeneration," he stared at pink-clad figure in front of him in shock.

Fang looked from Whidmore to Zelos to see those blue eyes narrow in irritation. "What of it?"

"Which one are you? I thought they were all dead. That means there's hope," Whidmore was growing excited. "Are there more of you?"

"Can you make me a sword or not, Gramps? Because if you can't? I'll go elsewhere," Zelos spat.

"Hey, man, don't snap at him. We need his swor-" Fang was cut off though when Zelos whipped around and glared at him.

"_Keep guard_," he ordered.

Fang crossed his arms childishly but made sure to look around so no enemies approached. So far, they were fine.

Zelos turned his attention back to Whidmore. "Lloyd Irving is King now. How do I know this isn't some trick?" Whidmore had gone from blissful and excited to hostile and suspicious.

The 'hero' scoffed, "Oh yeah. King Irving has nothing better to do than to trick some over-weight has-been blacksmith with masked heroes who speak of treason."

"So… You're going to _fight _him?" Whidmore asked, excited again.

"I need another sword to do that," Zelos's tone was tight and sarcastic.

"Oh, right right!" he got to his feet and began to dig around a chest in the back of his small shack of a market-place store. Zelos crossed his arms and watched him coldly.

"So, which one are you?" Whidmore asked Zelos as he dug around.

"The last one you would expect, I guarantee that," the redhead scoffed without mirth.

Whidmore glanced at him, seeing if he could figure it out, but he resumed his digging as he thought now.

"Are you Bryant or Wilder?" he asked.

Fang could see the immediate displeasure at being compared to whoever he had been mistaken for. "Are you kidding me? Regal Bryant is ten-times my size. The guy is a fucking monster. And he doesn't fight with a sword. Great Martel above, does anybody look at the pictures in the new history books or is it all speculation and childish fantasies?"

Whidmore quieted at this haughty response and continued looking for the sword.

"This isn't for me, by the way," Zelos said. "It's for _him_," he pointed at Fang. "So make the size appropriate."

Whidmore nodded quickly and did as he was told, pulling out longer swords now that fit more of Fang's body-type than Zelos's.

Finally he turned to look at the two, "These are all I have."

Zelos looked at Fang, "Come here; if they haven't come yet they aren't going to. Obviously they don't expect rebels in the marketplace," he motioned to the swords, "What do you think?"

Fang walked over to the swords, picking one up with wide eyes at the sharp blade. He looked it over; the hilt was black leather that fit the contours of his hand perfectly. The blade was significantly longer than Zelos's dagger. Which could be good or bad, depending on who his enemy was and how easily Fang would be able to take to swordplay. Fang considered the beautiful sword he held in his hands; dangerous and lethal. He ran a finger along the shining metal as Whidmore scowled.

"That's the warrior you plan to take to battle? He's just a child!" he exclaimed.

"Lloyd was just 17 when he fought Yggdrasil and the rest of Cruxis and united the worlds," Zelos was quick to jump to Fang's defense. Whidmore's head reared back in surprise. "He will do _just_ fine. I'll make sure of it," he hissed at the blacksmith.

The masked redhead looked back at Fang. He approached and examined the sword before looking Fang's body type over. "Can you lug this around, y'think?" he asked the avian-hybrid.

He nodded, "I think so. I'm sure the training will get me used to the weight. Especially if I'm going to carry it around constantly like you do."

"It's never safe. Of course you'll always have to have it with you," Zelos got an inch away from Fang's face in a confrontational manner. The teenager would never get used to the fact that Zelos had no personal-space bubble. "You're going to have to get used to the idea that the sword is an extension of yourself. A pointy, _killing_, extension of yourself.

"But…" Zelos pulled back an inch, his feet graceful and silent on the dirty cobbled ground below them as his eyes began looking at Fang's wings with that insightful look he'd get sometimes. Then he looked back at Fang's face and, the teenager just had a gut feeling, that the reason the burqa began to tighten over Zelos's cheeks was because he was engaged in a shit-eating grin. "You're used to having unnatural extensions of yourself. Aren't you, Fang?"

Fang was right when he had thought before he was lucky for being dubbed just as 'Kid'. When the red-head said his name, it was like venom. As though his name was something to be ashamed of.

"You're an asshole," Fang found himself saying for the thousandth time since he'd gotten to the messed up world.

Zelos smirked and he looked at Whidmore, "We'll be taking this. Stay alive, old man. Because, soon enough, the world's gonna be free again and this city will be able to flourish once more."

"Palmacosta has been through a lot, I'm sure we'll survive this too," Whidmore smiled at Zelos. "Thank you, Chosen One."

The ex-chosen sneered, "My name is _Zelos_."

"Now you know how those nicknames feel, hmm?" Whidmore smiled.

"I take it back. Go fuck off and die. I'm not saving you; I'm saving me," Zelos turned quickly and headed out of the shop and Fang stood in shock of the harsh words. Whidmore had a compassionate look in his eyes as he watched Zelos's disappearing figure.

"He didn't mean it," Fang found himself promising to Whidmore.

Whidmore smiled at him, "I know he didn't. Just get going before he leaves you."

Fang picked the sword's sheath up and covered the blade as he clumsily put it in one of his belt loops and scampered after the escaping Tethe'allan.

After leaving the city and walking for a good half-mile in silence, Fang turned to Zelos. "What the hell was _that _about? Why did you say what you said to him!"

Zelos took off his mask before looking at Fang's sword like it was the most interesting thing in the world. "That's not how you wear a sword," he sighed, lifting his head and looking at Fang like he was lecturing a five-year old child.

"I don't care! That guy helped us! So, he was a little sarcastic," Fang lifted his arms up in the air in a 'so what?' fashion. "Like that gives you an excuse to snap at him! You're the biggest smart-ass I think I've _ever_ met! The entire time you're insulting me _and_ Whidmore and he decides to call you Chosen or whatever the hell it was that he did and you freak? That's _psychotic_! Why am I even _traveling_ with your crazy ass? Why did I ever agree to do this! Ah-! _Hey_!" Fang's breath caught in his chest when Zelos grabbed his sword from his hilt with a scowl, shaking his head to himself.

Fang got flustered at how Zelos had just felt the need to invade his personal space constantly. "What the hell? That's my sword!"

"You've had it for all of four seconds and you're already attached? I guess that's a good sign, warrior," Zelos said, pulling out a small belt-like piece of fabric from his leather bag.

He held it up in front of Fang's face before attaching it to the sword, "You see this?"

Fang crossed his arms stubbornly, "Yuhuh."

"Fucking teenagers. Nobody is articulate anymore," Zelos shook his head.

"YES SIR. I SEE THAT WONDERFUL PIECE OF FABRIC YOU JUST SHOVED IN MY FACE. Is that any better, your highness?" Fang snarled.

Zelos smirked, "And you call _me_ a smartass?"

"I'm not like this around normal people," the teenager insisted.

"Well," Zelos reached over and fastened the belt around Fang's waist, "This piece of fabric, _smartass, _is going to keep your sheath nice and secure around you while you run around. Or fly around, in our case."

Fang scowled, "Stop dressing me like I'm five. I've got this," he slapped Zelos's hand away and the redhead laughed.

"Stop acting like your five then and do as your told."

Fang mumbled curse words under his breath as he finished fastening the belt. "Okay, there. DONE."

Zelos smiled, "Alright, now we go and find a nice secluded place in the woods and train you in swordplay until the only part of your body that isn't bruised are your eyebrows."

"Uhm, what was that?" Fang stared at him like he had to be kidding.

The ex-chosen just began laughing a hearty guffaw that made Fang stare down at his sword with a scowl.

"I hate my life," Fang hissed to his new weapon.


	9. The Cracked Mask Breaks

**Author's Notes**: I'm a little confused as to the lack of feedback on my last update. I want everybody to know that I feed off those reviews. If you don't review, I'm not likely to update(lol even though this is, like, five days after my reviewless chapter). Let me know what you think! If you like an aspect of a chapter, I'll try and reincorporate it later in the story! Anyway, here's a nice angsty chapter. lulguylove 3

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Zelos didn't stop flying until they reached a building in the middle of over-grown woods. Fang frowned in confusion.

"What are we doing here? This place is completely flooded with…" he searched his head for the words.

"Flourishing flowers and funky fun?" Zelos waggled his eyebrows at Fang with a grin.

"…"

"That's the point," the smile dropped as Zelos began his intellectual reciting. "The abbey here is abandoned and the woods around here cover it quite well from anybody who might be looking for us. We need to blend in if we're going to be training," he walked over to the building and he tried the handle with no success in opening the abbey.

"Damn it," he scowled.

"Just break in," Fang suggested.

Zelos looked at him before looking back at the abbey. The redhead with what, Fang had always thought to be, low morals seemed torn inside.

"Alright," he finally said before he spun and delivered a nice swift kick to the wood of the door.

It collapsed and thunked to the dusty ground inside the abbey.

"We'll be sleeping in there, but you should get used to the open air," Zelos told him.

"What does that even mean?" Fang asked.

"It means, DON'T CHILL IN THE ABBEY," he turned swift and poked Fang's nose, "It's gross and stale in there anyway," the redhead scowled, letting his arms fall to his side.

"… Are we going to start the training now or later?" Fang asked dryly.

"I guess now if you really want to," Zelos shrugged.

"I don't really want to do anything," Fang confessed, leaning against the abbey's walls as he stared up at the sky. He let his wings stretch out nice and wide. Zelos's icy eyes watched him for a moment before he nodded.

"That's alright. You can rest."

That was unlike Zelos to give in so quickly to something Fang wanted to do.

"Zelos, you alright?" Fang inquired.

"Hmm?" Zelos looked from whatever he'd been looking at to gaze at Fang in surprise.

"I asked if you were alright. You seem a little preoccupied," Fang evaluated.

The redhead smiled, warm and nostalgic, "Yeah, I'm alright. I'm just thinking about the person who lived in this abbey a long time ago."

"Another long lost friend?" the teenager pressed tentatively.

"My sister."

"Oh," taken aback by that, Fang looked back up at the sky before he took a seat in the grass.

"She died from her disease before any of this started happening… I'm sort of glad, y'know?" he took a seat down where he had been standing in the doorway of the abbey. He smiled nostalgically, "I'm glad she didn't have to get hurt in the war or anything."

Zelos picked up a piece of grass in his fingers, "She was my half-sister. Her mother… Her mother was nuts," he began to tell Fang. Zelos had no idea why he felt like talking about it but for some reason it felt safe enough to talk. To let Fang in on what was running around in his head. "She killed my mother. It was an attempt to murder me but her aim was shit. She hit my mother and killed her. Seles's mother was executed and Seles was sent here," he pointed over his shoulder into the doorway as he looked from the grass back to Fang, "to this abbey."

He let his hand fall back to his lap where he started picking at the blade of grass, "After the joining of the worlds and the elimination of the title of Chosen One, she came to live with me. It lasted a little while, but…" his hair fell into his face as his head fell further down between his hunched shoulders.

Fang decided not to press and to let Zelos continue in his own time.

Zelos finally lifted his head and he gasped softly. Fang had been examining a tree across the small opening space of the abbey so he had to turn his eyes back to Zelos to see what had got him off guard. He figured Zelos had seen an enemy of some sort.

Zelos had tears falling down his cheeks and a hand lifted to cover his mouth in a strangely child-like manner.

"But she died. She died-d," Zelos cried, shaking his head. "It took so long-g, Fang," he was saying, "She suffered s-so much. In the end, sh-she was begging-ing me," the older man took a sharp breath as his chest hitched up slightly before collapsing into more shudders.

Fang's face had softened considerably now.

"She b-begged me to kill her," he croaked out. "Over and over. I-I… I-I'm not new to watching people d-die, Fan-Fang," Zelos gasped again, wiping at his eyes frantically as though that might make the tears stop. "But-t… But that's not watching-ing… not-t… not-not watchi-ing…" He leaned forward again as he cried. His shoulders quaked as his hair shielded his face from the teenager.

Fang didn't know what to do. He'd never seen Zelos so upset, except for, perhaps, the initial running away from King Irving.

He got up from his spot and walked over to Zelos slowly, making sure to make his steps known so the older man knew he was coming near and wouldn't attack.

Slowly, he knelt down and put a hand on Zelos's shoulder, giving it a soft rub to soothe him. "I couldn't-t do it. I cou-couldn't kill her," Zelos turned away from Fang slightly as he trembled.

"I don't know anybody who would blame you for not doing that," Fang said, soft.

The chosen of Tethe'alla whimpered and let his body be controlled completely by the quaking sobs. Fang rubbed his back kindly, staring up at the sky now. He blinked back a few tears that had budded and took a deep breath.

After about ten minutes of crying and whimpering, Zelos started to get his composure back.

"I'm going to go for a walk," the swordsman mumbled, standing up and wiping at his eyes.

"Crying is nothing to be ashamed of, Zelos," Fang gently informed the mess of a man in front of him.

"I should have been done crying ages ago. I'm too old for that shit," Zelos snapped at Fang, his voice cracking towards the end.

"… Then go take a walk. I'll be here when you get back," Fang said in an annoyingly patient tone that made Zelos want to put him through the wall.

"You better be," Zelos glared at him, "I need you to help me kill the dragon."

Then the red-head skulked off into the woods to be alone.

Fang sighed and looked down at his sword. He drew it from it's sheath and ran his finger slow and careful along the shimmering blade.

Never before had he had the opportunity to really wield and understand a weapon while he had been with the flock. They fought hand-to-hand because they had to. To bring weapons into the whole thing? Well, they were more likely to hit each other's wings than to actually nail a bad guy.

One time, he'd gotten his hands on some guns. That had been completely violent and vicious. Something that he appreciated having notched in his belt as an experience, but not something he'd go back to _willing_. A gunslinger with wings? That was a little too fantastical in his book.

He stood up from where he'd been knelt down before and he brought the sword out into a fighting position. Something he had seen in pictures and movies before. It felt strange, so he was sure he was doing it wrong.

Slowly, he let his hands guide the blade down to slice through the air. The breeze whooshed helplessly under the metal and Fang's eyes narrowed. It'd be so easy to hurt somebody with a weapon of this caliber. He wondered how long it took to master something like a sword. He wondered how long Zelos had held a dagger in his hands and he wondered if he ever used the blade to hurt somebody he now regretted hurting.

Remorse didn't seem to be a forte of the redhead's personality, Fang would have said an hour ago. But after that display of an emotional breakdown? Well, he'd have to recall that opinion. Zelos had had a soft-spot for his baby sister.

He let the blade sink into the dirt and he leaned against the hilt while looking over the outside of the abbey. It probably hurt like hell to come to this place for Zelos, he realized. It had to remind him completely of his sister.

Fang was glad he didn't have anybody to worry about anymore like a family. It simplified matters a lot.

He knew that, when he had fallen down the hole and ended up in Wonderland(he had begun calling this world that, since they were so much alike anyway), he had left nobody behind.

Sure, if the flock knew they would have been upset. The glorious part of it was, though, that they _didn't _know. They had no idea where he had gone so they couldn't worry about him slaying a dragon in Wonderland because, for all they knew, he could have been in Egypt uncovering mummies.

A little part of him was sore about that though. He was like Zelos in that manner; that they both were almost completely alone.

… Maybe he didn't have to hurry so much to go home. After all, Fang hadn't had anybody to talk to before Zelos in at least four months.

And, even though Zelos was kind of an asshole? Fang liked him well enough.

Now, he wasn't exactly positive whether those feelings of friendship were being returned but he figured that, since Zelos had the decency to help him out so much, the Tethe'allan didn't completely hate him.

… At least, he _hoped_ he didn't.


	10. Strike!

**Author's Notes**: Update update yay yay yay! I almost don't want to go on with the plot because of how much I love seeing these two interact. Oh, by the way, I have no idea how to use a sword. So if you know, don't correct me. This is fan fiction so bleeeeh.

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"What you need to know about your sword is that it's two-handed," Zelos said, pacing around Fang with the glint of a killer in his eyes. "What's your dominate hand?" his icy gaze lifted from the sword to the face of the learning teenager.

"Uh, my right, I guess."

"Grip right under the hilt with your right hand; put your left hand right below that," Zelos looked from Fang's face back down at the hilt. Fang gripped it as told.

"Your right hand is not used for striking. Keep your fingers semi-tight, but keep your pinky, ring, and middle finger all considerably tighter," the redhead continued. Fang did so silently.

"Your stance is all _kinds_ of fucked up," he scowled, putting his hand under the bottom of Fang's hilt before lifting it considerably. "See how you've got it a little bit above your bellybutton?" Fang nodded, "Keep it there, pointing slightly outward."

"Why outward?" Fang inquired.

"If your charged at, the tip will shish kabob the sucker who did the charging," replied his teacher.

"Oh… I guess that works then," Fang mused. Then he thought back on something Zelos had said previously, "Why don't I strike with my right hand?"

"Because you need to use your right hand for guiding the blade. Your strength is from your left arm while your right hand acts as an axis for the sword," Zelos informed him.

"You really know your stuff, then, huh?" the teenager smirked.

"You could call me an expert," Zelos stepped back now, leaving Fang in his stance.

"Footwork," the ex-chosen suddenly said, looking at the demi-avian teenager's feet. "Left foot behind your right foot. You want to use the balls of your left foot in order to balance."

Fang adjusted accordingly.

"When you strike, you push with your left foot, sliding your right foot on the ground and raise your sword. Now bring your left foot back into position and strike," Zelos was pacing around Fang again and the teenager faltered. "STRIKE!" Zelos snapped. Fang struck at an invisible target with a sloppy execution that made Zelos scowl.

"Strike again," the ex-noble sneered.

"You're making me nervous," Fang snipped back at him.

"Don't worry about hitting me, _my_ defense is way sharper than _your_ offense," he laughed at the very idea.

Fang struck again with a lot more force.

"Keep your right arm straight," was all Zelos said before repeating the order, "Strike!"

Fang struck and suddenly Zelos punched him in his right arm. "Damn it!" Fang exclaimed.

"Straight, not locked," Zelos glared into his eyes angrily, only inches away which infuriated Fang more than the order did. "If you lock it- you'll just break it."

"Good thing I'm a fast healer then," Fang hissed.

"You want to put that to the test, kid?" Zelos smiled.

Fang relaxed his arm slightly, still keeping it straight, and struck again without warning. Zelos moved out of the way effortlessly.

"Strike!" Zelos snapped again and again.

After the fortieth yell of 'strike', Fang turned and brought the sword angrily down at Zelos, "I'm tired!" he snapped angrily.

As he thought would happen, Zelos had brought his shield up and blocked the blade of Fang's sword. Fang pulled his sword back and brought it down at Zelos again.

The redhead spun around, brought himself to a halt behind Fang, and then bluntly slammed the shield into Fang's wings. The teenager gasped and hit the ground face first. Rolling over, he found the blade of Zelos's dagger under his chin. Zelos began to pull up slightly and the blade tightly pressed against Fang's olive skin. The teenager had no choice but to elevate his head.

His chest quickly lifting up with every panting breath, Fang met Zelos's eyes and the expert swordsman smiled down at Fang smugly without a hint of remorse in his expression.

"You think I'm tough? You should see that dragon," the taunting older man simpered at Fang.

"I'm tired, I don't want to train anymore," Fang snapped up at him.

The humor disappeared from the older man's face. "Tough luck!" Zelos barked, "You don't get a time-out in battle and you won't get one while training with me."

Fang silently eased up to his feet and walked over to his sword which had fallen and pierced into the dirt when he discarded it in the middle of Zelos's attack. Even though he hated to admit it, his teacher was right; he needed to tough it out.

"You used your arm muscles too much," the redhead commented. His temper had simmered down after the initial yell at Fang to stop bitching and man up.

"Sorry. I'll exercise my ass muscles a little more to your tastes," Fang snapped quickly.

Zelos laughed, "You need to put your entire body into the swing," he advised.

"Sure, whatever," was Fang's response.

"Don't 'whatever' me about this shit, Fang. It's not some instrument Mommy dearest is forcing you to practice so you can look cute at a recital," Zelos was serious now, "This is life and death. That sword is _you_ now. It's an extension of yourself. Don't swing at somebody unless you intend to kill them."

Fang realized just then how easy it would have been to kill Zelos had the redhead not been so quick on his own feet. Had the mage's judgment been even slightly off, Fang could have split his skull or pierced his chest.

Fang could have killed his only help in all of Wonderland.

"I'm sorry for attacking you," Fang sighed.

"No kidding?" the redhead scoffed.

"I guess I wasn't thinking…"

"Uhuh," Zelos waved his hand in the air like it was nothing. "Strike!"

"What?" Fang blinked, he couldn't have heard Zelos right. They had just had a heart-to-heart! That earned some rest, right?

"STRIKE, YOU BITCH!"

Never mind. Zelos seriously wanted to keep training.

"HEY! I don't have all day! I should use all the time I waste watching you stare aimlessly at shit to paint the landscape! God knows I could have done a 20x40 foot mural by now.

"STRIKE!"

This was only day five too… Ugh. Fang felt like he'd aged ten years since he'd met Zelos.


	11. Salvation or Distraction?

**Author's Notes**: I'm changing up the POV a little bit in this chapter. Fang is a fun staple but Zelos might be more over-powering in the next few chapters due to his knowledge on certain subjects. However, everything is subjective to my mood when I write the chapters. I'm going to answer a question in this note. Somebody asked if Max will show up at all in this story. Right now? I'm not planning on having her in it. This is mainly a Fang and Zelos fic centering around them. Just them, not Fang's relationship with Max or Zelos's relationship with Sheena. I don't even know how I would begin to have Max get involved with this story because of Fang leaving at the end of his self-titled novel. Not to mention the fact Fang's not even on Earth anymore. Everything is subject to change however. I also don't plan on adding any TOS characters either (mostly because everybody's dead but Kratos). … Okay, here's a rather lengthy update to the story! (Training is almost done with. I think the next chapter will be dedicated to wrapping it up and then from there on out will be the rising actions to lead to our climax of Fang and Zelos slaying the big bad Jabberwocky!)

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It was impressive to say the least that Fang was doing so well. To watch the initially sloppy swipes turn into swiftly executed slices that cut through the air quickly and efficiently had been pleasantly surprising for Zelos to see.

Strike after strike at the wood Zelos was throwing at the teenager could be heard at the abbey. The lumber clattered to the ground and Fang cut everything Zelos threw at him in half without much problem.

Yeah, Zelos was kinda impressed.

The redhead brushed his hair out of his face, looking at Fang who slipped his sword into it's sheath in a silent 'I'm awesome at everything' manner that reminded the Tethe'allan of a seraphim he had known years ago.

Too bad Kratos had gone off on into space. The chosen would have liked a little more help than the amateur swordsman.

Now, don't get him wrong, Zelos hadn't been nearly that skilled on his 14th day of handling a sword. However, Fang only knew how to fight hand-to-hand and do the basic self-defense with that sword. Yeah, he was really good at what he _did_ know, but knowing how to break some assaulters nose wouldn't help while trying to kill a dragon.

Fang stretched and a cocky smile came upon his lips, "We done already?"

"Throw back the wood. We'll practice with the smaller targets," Zelos waved his hand in the air lazily as he thought to himself.

Fang didn't have to be the top samurai around. He didn't need to be a summoner or even an axe wielding freak-lumberjack. Fang needed to be one thing in the fight with the dragon. That thing was not the hero.

He needed to be a distraction.

The avian-hybrid seemed to think he'd be delivering the final blow to the dragon as the days progressed. Maybe that had been Zelos's fault for putting so much emphasis on getting his help. If Fang knew some of the things Zelos could do in battle with adrenaline pumping and instinct at the forefront of his mind? Well, Fang wouldn't be nearly as smug about his abilities to cut a few sticks in half.

Zelos picked up the wood that had fallen to his feet, juggling it in his hands as he grinned over at Fang, "Can you cut it _while_ I juggle?" he taunted.

Zelos could do it, if Fang ever wanted to see it done.

The teenager rolled his eyes, "I wouldn't want to damage your face any more than it already is." The reply was mocking. Nobody could use a sword like that. To Fang? It wasn't some agile weapon. It was bulky because the way he used it felt bulky.

That was the main reason Zelos would be using Fang as a distraction in the battle.

"Puss," Zelos simpered before chunking the half-cut logs at Fang. The teenager drew his sword fast and cut the logs in quarter pieces now.

In the time it took to get five cuts in? Zelos could have tripled it and made kindling out of the wood. Maybe even skin the bark off of it.

That might be a little far fetched. He wasn't sure his dagger's blade was sharp enough to remove the bark anymore.

"Are you ever going to spar with me?" Fang had lifted his voice to inquire.

The ex-playboy blinked his eyes, forgetting he was in the middle of training the mutant. It took about a second to regain his composure. Fang, just like everybody else he'd ever known, hadn't caught his slip-up.

"You're not _ready_ to spar with me," he laughed.

"Chopping up our camp-fire wood is not going to get me ready to slay the Jabberwocky." Zelos could almost see the childish young boy pouting 30 feet away from him.

"First of all? It's a dragon," Zelos scoffed, "Secondly, you've been using the word 'me' a lot. Do you really think I'm not going to be there to help you?" He began waltzing over to the teenager, looking at him with bright blue eyes expectantly.

He hated having to crane his neck up to make eye contact with somebody so naïve as Fang. It wasn't as though Zelos thought height equated to anything that made the bird-kid better than him, but there was just something demeaning about having to look up so much just to make fucking eye contact. It made him feel a little less in-control.

At least Zelos knew the view sucked from Fang's point of view.

"What is the plan?" Fang inquired, purposely letting the blade of the sword make a _ssshhhhhink! _noise as he sheathed it nice and slow. What a little dramatic bastard.

"The plan is that we kill the dragon," Zelos scowled, picking the wood up in his arms now so he could throw it in their woodpile.

"No kidding? I thought we were gonna domesticate it," came the sarcastic comment over Zelos's shoulder.

He would be irritated with the sarcasm if it weren't for the fact that Zelos was pretty sure Fang had grown to doing that because of his influence…

"You're not ready to fight it," Zelos cocked his hip out slightly to rest the wood he hadn't yet placed in the pile lightly against his pelvis. He blew a strand of hair out of his face before lifting his gaze confidently upward at Fang. "So don't even think about fighting it."

"When am I going to be ready?" Fang demanded.

"When you don't suck as fucking hard," Zelos found himself snapping. His temper fuse was a lot shorter than it used to be. He turned away from Fang and began placing the wood on the pile. Fang was silent for a long moment.

"How long were you isolated in that prison, Zelos?"

Oh, great. Psychiatric help. Whoohoo.

"I didn't have the liberty of having my day planner plastered on the wall, so I'm not quite sure," Zelos replied.

"An estimation?"

"Too long."

Fang grew quiet and he walked over to Zelos, beginning to straighten the pile of wood for him helpfully.

"Were you the only one in there until I got thrown in?" the teenager tilted his head slightly towards Zelos in curiosity.

"Yeah," Zelos murmured in a distracted manner as he thought about something a little more relevant. Like what kind of rabbit-centered dish they should have for dinner. Rabbit stew sounded good. Rabbit soup? Rabbit steak, perhaps. He wished he could make tequila out of rabbit. That's what he really wanted. Some good old-fashioned tequila squeezed straight out of the veins of a rabbit. Just like Grandma used to make!

"You ever get lonely?" Fang was still talking.

"All my friends are dead. Who did I have to miss?" Zelos rolled his eyes.

"None of my friends know where I am," Fang confessed.

Zelos glanced at him to gage the boy's facial expression. Fang was serious and a little reserved. His eyebrows were pulled together and his jaw was tight from emotional discomfort. This was him putting trust in Zelos. This was Fang showing his chaperone that he wanted to be friends. Or at least a fighting companion that he could trust.

You had to invest something in order to receive payment in return. To get Zelos to trust him, he'd need to place a part of him out on display.

The fact Fang was an outcast didn't surprise Zelos for some reason.

"You don't say?" was his decided response to Fang's confession. He was no priest, after all.

"Well, I left them. It was for the best," Fang continued, despite the hints from Zelos that he didn't want this trust. Too much trust always led to bad things.

"Hmmm." Zelos poked a piece of wood into a tighter position as he listened to Fang.

"They can get along just fine without me. So I started wandering around Earth. They don't know how to contact me- I like it like that," Fang walked away from Zelos back to the wood he had cut up and he came back with an arm full, placing it on their pile. "Then I fell into this hole in a tree and I ended up here. To them? I might as well be on Earth. I abandoned them all the same."

Zelos barked a laugh suddenly and Fang turned, staring at him in shock of that reaction.

"What's so funny?" Fang snarled.

"You think _that's_ abandonment! Oh, the joys of being a kid who doesn't know any better," Zelos snickered at him, shaking his head. He crossed his arms and leaned back, his butt was resting on the wood. One leg came up lazily so he could rest his arms on his knee and Zelos showed Fang a big Cheshire grin.

"You're just too cute sometimes. Being all emotional when you haven't done shit that even deserves any of your brooding," the redhead added.

"I'm an avian-hybrid. AKA a bird kid," Fang hissed, crossing his arms over his chest now. "I can't think of a lot of good things that have happened to me in my life time."

"I obviously need to readopt the nickname 'whiney bitch' for you," Zelos decided.

"You don't have so many problems," the teenager blurted.

Zelos cocked his head and smirked up at him in silence. Fang huffed and looked away at a tree as silence entered between the two.

"We'll train tomorrow, like we've been doing for the past couple of weeks," Zelos's voice was unaffected by Fang's accusation. He looked back at the redhead in slight surprise but he wouldn't press it. Sometimes that unpredictability worked to his personal advantage. Whether or not Zelos kept grudges didn't matter because Fang couldn't seem to tell whether Zelos was mad or not after five seconds because then the ex-chosen would flash a smile or he'd just act like he hadn't heard anything at all.

"Okay," Fang sighed.

"Depending on how I think you do tomorrow will decide whether or not we move on to sparring and spells and things of those sorts," Zelos pushed himself lightly off the woodpile and then headed into the abbey.

Fang stood outside for a long time before he looked down at his sword. "Cool. Now I can improve."

Zelos shut the door to the abbey behind him, looked down at his dull dagger, and said, "Fuck. Now I've got to sharpen you. I figured I'd have another damn week before he started bitching at me."


	12. Kid VS Old Man

"Does the idea of fighting to the very brink of death intimidate you any, Fang?" Zelos asked, drawing his sword as he looked across the field at Fang.

The teenager had his sword held up, steady and vigil.

"No."

"Really?" Zelos smiled, his feet moving in fluid motions that made it seem like his legs were a separate part of his body. If you just watched Zelos from his waist up, the only thing that gave away his movement was the changing background behind him.

The redhead pulled out his dagger. His shield was strapped to his forearm and he kept circling Fang, eyebrows lifted as he awaited his answer.

"Every battle I've ever been in has been to the death. The only difference about the battle with the Jabberwocky is just the fact we've got a way bigger target," the teen commented, his feet matching Zelos's in pace but going in the opposite direction so they were making a large clock-wise circle.

"That's a good thing to keep in mind," the older man shrugged.

"Are we going to keep pacing until we make a crop-circle or are you going to-" Fang was going to finish the question with 'spar' but he was cut off to find Zelos charging and the dagger coming down swiftly. Zelos had been aiming for Fang's heart.

Fang barely managed to lift his large sword up to block the attack.

The two blades clinked together and Fang glared up with earnest brown eyes currently clouded from the adrenaline. The brunette grunted as he tried to thrust upward enough with his weapon to knock Zelos off his feet and make him back off.

Zelos pulled his shield up, pressed it up to the blade to replace the pressure from his dagger and pushed at Fang's sword. Fang stumbled back from the unbelievable strength behind the attack, knocking himself into a tree.

He had about two seconds before Zelos charged and jumped at him with his legs spinning, looking to clock him right in the face if Fang didn't duck fast enough.

The avian-hybrid pressed up against the tree with his back and knelt down fast. Zelos's dirty cream boots slammed into the bark and Fang heard quick _CRRRACK_ as the tree got hit. The plant seemed just as caught off guard from the attack as Fang had been; it stood motionless for about five seconds before the trunk split in half and fell to the ground.

He turned, staring at the tree in shock and then Zelos's foot made contact with Fang's shoulder blade. The kick brought Fang down to his hands and knees. Angrily, he let his wings flap hard and heavy a few times. The wind that occurred at least inconvenienced Zelos because the redhead backed off to try and avoid the force of the air-blasts.

"Can your fairy wings do that!" Fang snapped, pushing himself off the ground and slamming his sword down to try and hit the redhead.

Zelos blocked it with his shield but found himself suddenly on his back at the force. Fang kept pressing the blade downward on the shield. Maybe it would crack and break. Maybe Zelos would realize Fang was a bigger asset than he seemed to think. Maybe, just maybe, this would earn the redhead's respect and conversation could be filled with a little less bickering.

Brown narrowed eyes glared down into the bright blue abyss of Zelos's irises. The Tethe'allan's eyes were wide, seeming surprised at being forced down to the ground. If he didn't get out of this position quick enough, Fang would think he was hot stuff for making a cute little Zelos-shaped hole in the dirt.

That would just not work for the more experienced warrior.

Zelos tried to pull his knees up to his chest, using the shield to cover his limbs. Fang was quicker though and used those long gawky legs to knee Zelos and then hold the ex-philanderer's legs down by his shin pressing tight against the losing man's lower thighs.

"You think you're hot stuff, kid?" Zelos snarled, looking a lot angrier than Fang felt comfortable with.

He almost wanted to let up in the battle but he had a feeling Zelos would know if he went easy on him and he didn't want to feel that wrath either.

The teenager kept Zelos pinned, "Personally, I think I'm winning, _old man_."

That nickname probably hadn't been the most intelligible thing that had ever left Fang's lips.

Zelos let out an angry battle cry and started to try and force Fang off with more power than he'd been showing before. The exphere, the one that Whidmore had seen and used to identify Zelos with back in Palmacosta, was glowing now.

Fang didn't know how Zelos did it, but he managed to muscle his way back to his feet just long enough to change the score.

Now Zelos was on top of him, his knee slammed into Fang's abdomen and the teenager gasped in pain while Zelos glared down at him. Fang made a move to try and look down at his stomach to try and estimate how much of Zelos was bearing on his body and to see how he might get loose. When his chin lowered was when he felt the cold press of metal against his throat.

"Instant kill," Zelos was smiling down at him now that he had won the spar. "I am the victoooooor."

Fang scowled, "Barely," the brunette snipped.

"There is no such thing as 'barely' winning," Zelos stood up, putting his sword away with a smile as he held his hand out to help Fang up. "You either win or lose. In our battle, we'll either live or die."

"If I hadn't called you an old man, you wouldn't have gotten pissed off enough to get me off of you," Fang insisted.

"We can 'what if' this all night, whiney bitch," Zelos had his hands on his hips, grinning at Fang despite being a little out of breath and the sweat that was running down his cheeks. "I won, though. If that had been a real battle, I would have sliced your neck."

"Uhuh," Fang huffed, crossing his arms over his chest after putting his sword away.

"I think you're _very _ready, though," Zelos suddenly said, his smile fading as he looked at Fang.

The teenager blinked, staring at Zelos like he had to have misheard him. "We're ready?"

"Yup," Zelos replied, hands still on his hips as he looked up at Fang. "You're ready. We'll make the plan tonight during dinner and then we'll go and make our way to Meltokio once again to kill the dragon."

"I'd be lying if I said I wasn't really pumped up," Fang was smiling dorkily down at Zelos.

The smile wasn't returned, "I wouldn't be," and the redhead turned to go wash all the sweat off of him.

* * *

**Author's Notes**: Alright, please tell me I managed to make this fight-scene not gay. There's a lot of body-parts touching in this and I'm trying not to write a slash fic here. Sometimes people just assume two main guy characters are just gonna get together. That's not the case in this fic. I would like to think the anger Fang and Zelos consistently show for each other would scare off any ideas of slash but some people like to think of that behavior as flirting. (I'm not against slash, so don't anybody dare flame me for shit like that. It's just not the point of this fic.) So, comments on my first ever written fightscene? I want to know what I need to fix because the next fightscene is going to be the big bad dragon and I want that to be _perfection._


	13. Darkness Resurfaces

**Author's Notes**: Things aren't as simple as just fighting the Jabberwocky, Zelos and Fang! BAHHAH. Mainly because I love this story and I want to pad it with as much plot as my little brain with allow. Enjoy the newest installment.

* * *

Fang sneered, "It smells in here," he couldn't help but complain to Zelos who stood by his side with his white cloth burqa covering his entire face with the exception of his eyes.

Zelos looked up at him and sighed, "I know," he seemed sympathetic to Fang's distaste for once. The old witch-doctor's potion shop always smelled like shit. If he hadn't needed the potion badly enough, he wouldn't be forcing either of them into the building though.

The walls were dark, probably dirty but in this light it could have been paint. Zelos made a move to step forward and his breath cut off when his boot made contact with something soft, squishy, and that squeaked in surprise when he touched it.

"Rats too?" Fang's nose was scrunched up and he pulled up his shirt collar over his nose.

"Of course. Nothing here is fun or easy anymore," Zelos commented and he motioned for Fang to follow him up to the counter.

Step after step on the cobbled, filthy floors gave Zelos the unbelievable urge to go take a bath. He reached the counter that was made from a deep dark mahogany. His hands lifted so he could set them on the wood but he stopped himself and decided to put them on his hips instead so he'd have one less thing to clean later.

Behind the counter, the woman sat. She was hunched over and mumbling to herself. Before the take over of King Dickhead, the potion makers had been normal. Now they were all freaks and witches. It made Zelos's skin crawl to even go near a potion shop anymore. That was one of the main reasons he'd stopped fighting. He couldn't stand visiting these little shacks that were located in the dirtiest alley of the city. Right now, they were in Palmacosta again and they were stocking up for the big battle.

They were getting ready for the Jabberwocky.

Zelos made a face at the word entering his mind. It wasn't a Jabberwocky- it was a dragon. Fang's references to Earthen culture were starting to rub off on him.

"Excuse me?" Fang spoke up first at seeing Zelos was in his own little world currently.

The woman hunched forward more and started mumbling even louder.

Zelos grinded his teeth, "Yo!" he removed one hand from his hip and slammed a fist on the counter to get her attention. "We're here for some potion," he informed the woman in a loud and mighty tone. Fang looked at him with an unsure expression. He wasn't sure this was the way to go about getting the woman's attention.

She slowly stood up and swaggered over to the counter. "If you were to not fight, you would not need to use the potion," her voice croaked.

Fang took a step back and behind Zelos for some reason he couldn't comprehend beyond instinct.

The masked redhead crossed his arms, "Then you'd have no business, lady."

She smiled at them to reveal a golden front tooth. Fang's head reeled back and he squinted to see if he was seeing it right. Yeah, he was. One gold tooth and the rest were rotten and black.

"I suppose you're right, young man," she said. "What potions do you require?" she added.

Zelos pulled out a slip of paper and set it on the counter, "Ten of everything on that list," he ordered.

She picked it up and examined it, "Can you afford these potions and gels, boy?" she asked him, leaning over the counter to examine Zelos's cerulean eyes which narrowed as the woman got closer.

"Yes."

Her head tilted to one side and her black matted hair dropped over one shoulder, "How?"

"I'm a leprechaun and I just visited my rainbow," Zelos snapped.

"Does it really matter how we got the money? Money is money, right?" Fang asked.

She looked at Fang before her eyes went to his back which appeared hunched due to his wings. Zelos had given him a cloak to wear to cover the wings that worked pretty well. "You… You don't belong here, child," she hissed with an evil smile on her lips.

"Hellooooooooo!" Zelos waved his arms in the air dramatically as he leered at the witch, "I don't know if you understand but I'm kind of on a tight schedule. So can you get me the potions or not? If you can't, I want out of this stink-hole."

She looked at Zelos and smiled, "I have what you need," and she laughed a little cackle before going to the back room to retrieve their supplies.

Zelos turned and looked around the room. Fang frowned, "After here we go to M-" Zelos cut Fang off with a silent look of 'shut the hell up'. "… My mom's house?" Fang finished lamely.

Zelos nodded, "Yeah. We just have to get this stuff because your mom is crazy and large and might sit on us. Thus crippling our frail insignificant bodies," he told Fang.

Fang smirked at their little coded sentences, feeling a little like James Bond, and he looked in the direction where the woman had gone.

"I didn't know you had money," Fang whispered to Zelos.

Zelos's mask tightened as he broke into a silent grin. Fang's stomach seemed to fall open and do a flip as he felt a bad feeling jump him. Zelos wasn't telling him everything.

Like, how Zelos had absolutely no money on him and he was going to take the supplies and run like a bat out of hell.

The woman shuffled back into the room with a large bag. Zelos smiled at her, "Thank you so much," he said in a sugary tone. Then he grabbed the bag, pushed her up against a wall, and darted out of the building. Fang stood there for a second before realizing he should probably follow his mentor and he turned, scrambling to catch up with Zelos.

Zelos ran out the back alley. His white boots hit the ground in a quick rhythm before they cut off completely as he leapt up and took off into the air. Fang scowled, "A little warning would have been nice!" he barked up at Zelos, as he tried to tear off his cloak.

Zelos was hovering behind a roof to keep covered from view, but the brightness of his wings made it hard to stay hidden for very long. "Hurry up!" the older man snapped back.

"I'm trying!"

"TRY HARDER!"

Why was this cloak so hard to maneuver? Fang grunted, now just ripping at the cloth to get it off his body so he could follow Zelos. "Damn it!" he exclaimed, only half-way off with the clothes.

Looking up to see if Zelos was still in his covered spot, he saw nobody there.

No bright light from the wings and no silhouette from the shadows and contours of his slim body.

Had Zelos just completely deserted him?

Fang felt the bottom of his stomach drop, "Zelos?" he called out, helplessly tugging at the clothes has much as he could.

His breath hitched when he felt a needle pierce his neck. Legs wobbled beneath him and he vaguely felt the sensation of his knees slamming into hard concrete.

As the darkness began to consume him once more, Fang repeated the name of his only friend in all of the fucked up world he was stuck in. The friend who'd just deserted him.

"Zelos…"


	14. OneSided Epiphany

**Author's Notes**: I feel like I completely changed my writing style in this and I don't know why or how. Half-way through I was kicking myself to try and get out of present-tense. You can call it subconsciously artsy but I just call it me not agreeing with my brain. I'd apologize for this chapter being so short, but I'm an asshole. The next chapter will either be up tonight or tomorrow because it's either write this or write college essays and LOL who wants to go to college? (joking. yeesh.)

_

* * *

Her lips are like the sweetest tasting candy. Zelos lets his tongue wander longer than she likes, but she lets out a moan of acceptance. She doesn't mind his lingering tonight. Zelos's lips curve into a smile. She's starting to get used to the idea of this scene- the cuddling that leads to the kissing which will soon lead into more. Her hands lift up to feel those long red curls, but, after a second of fondling, she finds herself pulling away._

"_Oh, hunny, don't do that. We haven't even gotten started tonight," Zelos gives her a sad expression. His eyes were as wide as possible to complete his image of innocence. As though making out on the cot of the little cozy home in the middle of the night was the picture of purity._

_Her brown eyes are framed by eyebrows that are pulled together in a tight line._

_She's like every other woman on the planet. The last thing on her mind is the first thing on his._

_He leans forward, trying to kiss the tension out of her neck and she pulls away, refusing._

"_You're so stubborn sometimes," Zelos sighed._

"_I could say the same for you," she replies tersely._

_He leans back so he's to the wall and she's the only thing in front of him. His head tilts, sending his hair cascading over one shoulder, and he smiles warmly in her direction._

"_What's on your mind, pumpkin?" he asks._

"_Did you come back to save us that day at the tower of salvation because you felt guilty or because you knew that you'd never be let back into our good graces if you just let us all figure it out on our own?"_

_That voice of hers is so accusing and- and- and-… Damnit, so fucking _chief-like_. He can hardly handle it when she gets like this. She's used to bossing these ninjas around. She's not his boss. Nobody is _his_ boss._

_He lets it go though. Because what she's talking about is far more unnerving than the tone she's using to talk about it with._

"_A little of both," he says, deciding honesty is the best policy with her._

_She stares at him now. Sex probably won't happen tonight, Zelos decides._

"_Don't ever do it again, Zelos," she finally orders._

"_Don't ever do what again?" he asks quietly, his face softens as he realizes that this has been on her mind for a long time. Probably the entire time they were cuddling and the kissing that had followed._

"_Don't ever betray anybody like you did us. I know you don't think we were hurt, but it was devastating… Don't do it to anybody else, okay?"_

_She's pleading with him._

"_I won't," he assures._

"_Zelos, I'm serious," her voice is shaking and fades at the end of her confession._

_He smiles and leans forward, his hands wrapping around her's so their engagement rings clink together._

"_I'm serious too, Sheena."_

xXx_  
_

Darkness. Even after he opens his eyes in the cell, there's only darkness.

The teenager moans and then with a grunt his body lifts slowly up so he can lean against the wall. "What the hell happened, Zelos?"

His eyes dart around but there is no Zelos.

He betrayed him.

Zelos let him get captured.

He has no sword or shield anymore and he feels strangely naked without them.

No Zelos either and it's suddenly very lonely.

Zelos betrayed him.

Why did he betray him?

Lowering his head, Fang shut his eyes, figuring that he might as well rest considering that the only thing that can possibly follow this cell of darkness would be eternal darkness.

He misses Max. He misses Nudge and Angel and Iggy and Gazzy and even that annoying little dog, Total.

This would be one of the few times he would wish that he was with them again so intensely that he could swear his heart was wrenching out of his chest.

xXx

"Why does this always happen? Why? Because I'm the only person with more than half a brain and any agility to get things done? It must be that," Zelos was babbling to himself, pacing back and forth at the abbey as he tried to figure out what to do.

Fang was captured again.

"_Why_ can't he look over his shoulder for big bad scary people? I would think that, given our current situation, that he would be used to doing that by now!"

Zelos turned so fast he could hear the wind wisp around him in disarray.

"This isn't **faaaair**!" he whined.

Grabbing his sword, he began to hack away at the side of the abbey angrily.

"I trained him and he can't even get his damn cloak off," _chink chink_ **SLAM!** _chink_ "what a fucking _joke_!"

With a loud bang, the building's foundation began to crumble. Zelos felt his eyes widen before he backed up. The building was shaking with tremors before it slowly gave in to all the pressure it had felt over the years of the dark over-lord.

After two minutes passed, the abbey was no more; just a heap of debris.

"Damn it, Fang. Look what you made me do," Zelos stared down at what had once been his sister's home.

'_Don't ever betray anybody like you did us. . . Don't do it to anybody else, okay?'_

"Sheena Fujibayashi, even in death you're nagging me to do shit I don't do by instinct," he found himself saying.

Slowly, Zelos sheathed his sword and took a deep breath.

"Alright, King Dickhead… Here I come."

And he took a step away from the abbey towards Meltokio.


	15. Stop Flirting With Me

**Author's Notes**: I still haven't done that college homework. This is all I have to show for my 5 hours of internet surfing.

* * *

Guards everywhere. Why are they so afraid of him escaping? He's just a kid.

As if he'd be able to get out of the more secure cells anyway. Those cells were so dark that you couldn't even see your hand in front of your face.

Fang was probably drugged all to hell too.

Zelos took a deep breath to calm his nerves, standing underneath the manhole in the sewers of Meltokio. A rat squeaked at his feet and Zelos glanced down at it, "You got any shortcuts to suggest?" he asked it.

The rat hissed and scurried off into the darkness.

"I totally wish that was an option right now," he sighed.

Reluctantly, he put one hand on the ladder that led up to the streets. He could hear the guards disappearing off to change shift with their comrades.

It took ten seconds of intense thought on that ladder to convince himself to surface onto the cobbled streets of the city he once called his home.

He swiftly swung into one of the alleys and pulled himself onto the rooftop of the church. The castle was right there. Fang was inside in one of the old hide outs of the Princess, he was sure. They were the perfect prison and doubled as the perfect place for a child to hide away from her parents.

That hiding place just so happened to be located inside the throne-room of King Dickhead.

Slowly, Zelos's feet led him into the castle through one of the back rooms. He opened the window and slipped inside. He silently carried himself out of the empty room and into the hallway. In the room diagonal to where he stood, he heard voices.

"Your heroism is quite weak. It makes me wonder if you feel pain? Because, you are nowhere near feeling the pain I feel from your current betrayal," he could hear Dickhead's voice inquire to his newest victim.

Zelos held his breath and hoped that it wasn't Fang in there.

"Yes-s, don't hur-rt me any-anymore, King-g Ir-ir-ir-" the poor sap couldn't finish because he was sobbing so hard from fear.

The sadist in Zelos made him look around the corner into the room.

Just as he got a good view, he saw Dickhead slice the throat of Whidmore, the blacksmith from Palmacosta that had gave Fang and him the sword.

"Mother_fucker_," Zelos whispered, pulling away from the corner and running to the throne room where, luckily, Dickhead hadn't been. You can't get blood on those nice plush rugs after all.

Every guard he saw, he killed. It was so fast and fluid that Zelos couldn't tell where one guard started and the other began. All he knew was their blood was flowing on the floor of the Royal hallways, and that, once upon a time, he would have resented that.

He slid into the throne room and darted immediately for the throne that had once belonged to Hilda when she was small and innocent and beautiful. Before any of this had happened and she was just a figure-head at her father's side.

Zelos felt the nostalgia choking him and he shook it off before it could suffocate him. He needed to stay calm. He needed to find Fang.

His hand slammed into a stone behind the throne and a small passage opened.

Just as King Irving walked into the room, the door had closed behind Zelos.

King Irving sat down in his throne, not expecting a thing.

The redhead gasped inside the dark room. He'd forgotten this feeling of absolute darkness. It made him want to give his entire fortune to a charity that helped the blind, if there were such a thing anymore.

He stood, frozen by the enveloping black, before his mind slowly began to work.

_Take out your wings. They glow._

He did this, because his mind was usually right when it came to technical things like that.

It brightened the dirty hallway of the secret passage enough that Zelos was able to maneuver through the path. Finally he made his way to the small nook where Hilda used to hide whenever she didn't want to deal with her father's stuck up guests. Usually Zelos was right there beside her, egging on the defiant behavior because there just wasn't enough of that in nobility.

There was Fang, his wings wrapped around him to keep him feeling secure in the only way he knew. His body was shaking, which was the only reason Zelos could see him because of that invisibility gift he had.

And, in that tiny nook that Hilda had outgrew when she was about ten years old, they had stuck Fang so tightly that he couldn't move other than that pathetic trembling. Zelos reached out to touch Fang, to let him know that help was there.

His hand met something hard and glass.

Fang was in an even tighter spot than previously conceived. He was sealed in the nook like a fish in a tank. And, by the way Fang couldn't see the light, Zelos guessed it was a one-way mirror of sorts. The mirror thing didn't matter due to the unbelievable darkness on the other side.

His gut wrenched in an unfamiliar manner when Zelos realized that it would take startling Fang extremely to get him out. He had to break through the glass after all and, since Fang couldn't hear him, it would catch him off guard.

Given Fang's current emotional state, it would be a rough reunion for the both of them.

Zelos lifted his hand and placed it close to the glass, freezing it over with one of his older spells. Fang's shivering increased tremendously; Zelos ignored it and let the ice completely freeze over. Then he cracked the glass and let it fall at his feet.

Fang lifted his head, timid and slow, looking down at the glass as though he had just realized it was there. He stared at the frost that had formed on the feathers of his wings for a moment too while his shaking slowly stopped. Finally, he lifted those dark eyes up at Zelos. Never before had Fang looked so much like the child he was. Zelos almost felt guilty about not getting captured. _Almost._

"I told you to hurry, this is what happens when you don't listen to me," Zelos said, smiling to lift up the mood.

"You just left," Fang croaked out.

"Yeah, cause if I got free I could come and rescue your tall lanky ass," the redhead kept up the teasing._ 'See, this doesn't make anything different, kid. We're going to get back to our usual bickering selves and kill the Jabberwocky,'_ is what he wanted to tell Fang. But that would be just too sentimental for either of them.

"You didn't help me at all. You just left me there," Fang's wings were pulled tighter now around his lean body.

Zelos leaned over and stared into Fang's eyes stubbornly. "I didn't help you at all? You think I came back to the castle for tea?" he scoffed. "Are you really so blinded by your claustrophobia that you're going to sit there and insist I'm not helping you right now? Look at where you were two minutes ago and look at it now."

Fang didn't look anywhere else but at Zelos. His gaze was so empty and stoic that Zelos had a flash of Kratos Aurion staring at him. It gave him chills.

"Get up. We need to get out of here, get those sedatives out of your system, and then polish our Jabberwocky plan-"

"They have my sword, Zelos."

"Well, he just fucking killed Whidmore so I guess we better get your sword back," Zelos ran a hand through his hair, pacing around restlessly while Fang stayed coiled up in the nook.

"He killed…" Fang's voice trailed in shock.

"Yeah, he sliced his throat," the older man snapped.

Finally, Fang pulled himself out of the tiny hole they had put him in.

"Watch the glass," Zelos lectured without much thought.

"You act like you're my older brother sometimes, Zelos," Fang said, suddenly a warm smile on his lips.

Zelos turned to look at Fang like he had to be kidding. "Sentiments are a little…" he couldn't settle on a word.

Fang grinned, "Everybody needs a little sentiment."

"Stop that, you weirdo," Zelos scowled, "I was going to say 'meaningless'."

"I guess your wings do beat mine in some areas," Fang motioned to the fluttering wings that sprouted from Zelos's back.

"Stop flirting with me. We need to get out now," Zelos grumbled.

"You got in. How much harder should it be to get out?" the avian-hybrid inquired.

"Well, King Dickhead is out there chillin' like a villain in the very first room that's connected to this secret hobble in the castle so I'd venture to say it'll be really fucking hard, kid."

"Don't forget, we've got to find out where my sword is," Fang reminded.

Zelos turned and glared at him for a long moment.

"You're obnoxious."


	16. I'll Leave You To It

**Author's Notes**: I made a wallpaper to accompany the Fang in Wonderland story! It can be found on deviantart in my profile (there's a link on my fanfiction profile). It can also be found here by direct link : sexiestdrummer(dot)deviantart(dot)com/d2y4437

* * *

Fang felt like his head weighed a hundred pounds but he knew complaining about it would probably get him reeled on by Zelos. The redhead was leaning against the wall in the dark, his palms opened and pressing hard into the dirty walls while his legs stretched out behind him so his heels touched the opposite wall. Fang had no idea what Zelos was doing, but he figured interrupting whatever it was would be a bad idea.

The older man lifted his head and stared up at the ceiling with bright cerulean blue eyes that glowed with the help of his orange wings. They fluttered suddenly like a butterfly trying take off into the air and Fang realized that they did this because Zelos wanted to run.

But he couldn't, because that would mean he'd abandon Fang again.

Fang smiled at realizing Zelos was his friend.

"What the Hell are you smiling about?" Zelos snapped him out of his drugged up dream-land with his curt tone. Fang blinked and saw those blue eyes locked angrily on his face. "Because, last time I checked, we were stuck in here until Dickhead in there needs to take a shit or something."

"Maybe he'll leave to go cause some generic collateral damage elsewhere and we can get out then?" Fang suggested.

"As if we can even tell when he even leaves," Zelos grumbled, turning back to the wall, "This place is soundproof both ways." Red, finely-shaped aristocratic eyebrows pulled together into a crimson line of confusion on his forehead while he thought. His lips barely opened and he whispered, "There's gotta be another way out…"

Fang looked behind them into the unexplored corridor of the secret dungeon, "Should we even try to explore that way?" he inquired.

Zelos looked over with uninterested blue eyes. Silence drifted between the two of them before his eyes looked past Fang into the darkness they hadn't walked through.

"It's been shut off for a very long time. I think it cuts off on the top floor of the castle and opens up to the town-square. It doesn't do us any good in getting you back your sword," Zelos mumbled, casting his gaze to the ground now. His wings fluttered restlessly.

"We can go around when we go out and then swing back inside to find my sword," Fang urged.

"You're really pushy," the redhead didn't look at him.

Fang smiled, "Am I right though?" he let a rare smugness enter his tone. He felt pretty confident, probably because of the drugs messing with his system.

Zelos broke into a smile and lifted his head, turning to look at Fang again, "You're awfully self-assured right now for being the damsel I had to rescue out of a make-shift ferret cage in the back closet of an evil king."

Fang just shrugged innocently.

The smile on Zelos's face was gone again though and he turned his eyes to the wall.

"There's _gotta_ be another way out," he repeated, leaning forward and pressing his forehead against the cold wall.

Fang frowned, "Look," he began, "We only have one way out. Let's use it."

A deep breath made Zelos's shoulders rise as he tried to get his nerve up.

"What's the worse that can happen?" Fang inquired.

"I figured you wouldn't be enough of an idiot to seriously ask me that, but, as usual, you're surprising me every day," Zelos snipped. He stood up straight finally and began to walk in the direction he had come from.

The door had only been about thirty feet away from them. Zelos listened for a long time to what was going on on the other side. Finally he looked at Fang, gave him a nod, and, with a great amount of force, the door swung open fast and hard.

King Dickhead turned so quickly in his chair that it tipped slightly to one side. Zelos couldn't help but let the adrenaline control his mask of emotions. A large grin spread across his face, "Yo, Dickhead. We're here to mess shit up and there's not a damn thing you can do to stop us."

Fang puffed his chest out slightly like a head-strong rooster, "Damn straight," he said proudly.

Zelos let his feet spread apart to let himself get planted so the speech that was forming in his head would have a great physical foundation. This was it. Time to verbally slap this bitch.

"This bullshit reign of terror is done!" he barked, his hand on his dagger's hilt now. "No more running for me! I will end this! I will-"

"Zelos," Fang whispered, making Zelos cut his speech off.

"Whatever the hell it is that's so important needs to wait until I'm done lecturing him," Zelos growled over his shoulder.

"The Jabberwocky. We need to kill _that _first, I thought."

"WHO CARES!" Zelos cried out loudly, putting his hands on his hips and he glared at Fang, "We kill whoever has been putting us through any shit. We kill Dickhead because he's been causing some shit."

King Dickhead slowly made it to his feet as he watched the two in amusement.

"I get that, man. I'm all for it too, but wasn't the point of killing the Jabberwocky to make him defenseless when we finally killed him? Cause he can summon that dragon while we're here and that'll just turn the whole thing into a Mexican stand-off," Fang replied with a patient shrug.

"Okay, first of all? What the fuck is a fucking Mexican fucking stand-off and what does that have to do with what we're talking about?" Zelos spat at him.

"Well, a Mexican stand-off is when everybody involved in the fight dies," the teenager told Zelos like it was the most simple thing in the world to know.

Zelos stared at him like he had to be kidding. Then he cleared his throat and continued on his rant, "And, secondly? When the _fuck_ did you become a master strategist and why haven't you decided to help me in making plans until _just now _when it doesn't matter because I already ran dick first into a Mexi-fucking-can stand-off?"

"It didn't occur to me, I guess," Fang lamely stated.

"I like you better off drugs," Zelos hissed.

"This has been quite amusing," King Dickhead finally spoke, causing the two men to whip their heads around to look at him, " but I have to say that I have other things to deal with. Since you two seem so set on killing my 'Jabberwocky'-" he laughed at the name, "I'll leave you to it."

"Leave us to what?" Zelos bit out angrily on a tongue sharper than razor blades.

Dickhead smiled and turned to calmly stride out of the room.

"Yo! Asshole! Get back here! HEY!" Zelos yelled angrily, "This is not a _joke_! _Damn it_! Get back here, you bastard!"

Zelos ran forward with his dagger but King Dickhead pulled out the twin swords that had once belonged to Lloyd and he blocked Zelos's blade with his own. He forcefully pushed Zelos off of him and the redhead skid to the floor at Fang's feet.

"You aren't ready for our fight just yet, Zelos… That is, if you live past _this _fight. I'm getting ahead of myself," Dickhead smiled in a deliciously evil fashion.

"What are you talking about?" Fang snarled, helping Zelos up to his feet. The older man shoved Fang's hands away when he was standing independently of any support.

An explosion of a bellow lit up their eardrums in flames. Zelos gasped, quickly lifting his hands up to his ears as his body coiled up slightly. He could feel wind from whatever was roaring at them from behind. Fang's jaw was tight and he turned fearlessly to face their newest enemy. One large yellow eye was staring at him.

It blinked, the dark green eyelashes around it pulled together like a zipper-tight seal and the creature took another deep breath. Then another scream of a battle-cry escaped the creature's mouth.

Zelos stumbled backwards, grabbing Fang by the shirt to pull him along with him. Both of them were too busy looking at the dragon to look at each other.

"This is the Jabberwocky…" Fang found himself saying.

Zelos didn't hear him, though. His ears were ringing from their auditory raping.

Fang turned and looked at the redhead finally, "Zelos! We need to get my sword!" he yelled.

The chosen of Tethe'alla found no words to reply with. He just stared at the Jabberwocky with one thought plastered to the innards of his mind.

_We're dead._


	17. I'll Finish This

Author's Notes: Jabberwocky fight. Whoooot! I experimented with writing style again. Let me know your opinions! (as in review. Yeesh. Nobody's reviewing)

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They were standing in front of his massive body yet the tall skinny one managed to stare fearlessly up into his eyes. He was so boney though, he'd hardly constitute for a good meal. Taking a deep breath and letting it out through his nostril, the burst of air hit the small redhead. He stumbled back and into the taller one, staring up at the dragon with large blue eyes that seemed a little shell-shocked from the entire situation. He looked tender and vivacious.

That one would make a good meal.

**_..._**

What the hell had gotten into Zelos? Had he really been all talk? Was this the reason he'd lived longer than his friends? Because he was a coward?

Fang pulled Zelos up a little so he was standing straight. "I have to get my sword!" he yelled over the growling coming from the Jabberwocky's throat.

"Take your time," Zelos said, empty. He didn't look away from the dragon.

The teenager frowned, "Can you stay alive until I come back?" he asked.

"Uhuh," the redhead nodded, rolling his shoulders back to shake his goose-bumps off.

It took a moment before Fang turned and left. He took off running, figuring he had to be quick because there was no way Zelos could fight in that state. The avian-hybrid would be better off fighting alone with his lack of skill than Zelos was if he was that shaken up.

It probably should have bothered him more that Zelos was finally afraid of something, but those drugs had hazed his judgment a little.

**_..._**

It leans forward and presses its nose up against Zelos, taking deep breaths of his scent. The redhead is frozen for a moment before he staggers back and reaches for his dagger.

"You've fought plenty of dragons, tough guy. This is no different. This is gonna be _cake_."

His wings are still out. They spread out width wise, nice and large for anybody who wants to come see them. Nobody is there though. Just Zelos Wilder and the Jabberwocky of King Irving.

The Jabberwocky lifts its lips up and snarls at him in a sort of smile. Zelos takes two step backs, this time stable and calm, as he stares into the eyes of the dragon.

"Come and get some," he dares.

The talons on the dragon's feet dig into the flooring as he lifts his large mossy colored body off the ground. A deep breath is taken into his rough leather-textured lungs. So much of the air is taken from the room that Zelos feels a little short of breath and his shoulders hunch to make up for the inferiority he felt deep inside when he had to wheeze to get in any oxygen.

Then their eyes lock and they stare each other down. Blue verses yellow in a mixture of terror and accusation. This is where it ends for one of them. This is it.

Zelos pulls out his dagger and charges. The Jabberwocky rears up and the simmer of fire deep in his throat can be heard sizzling anything extremely flammable in the immediate area. Zelos jumps. The Jabberwocky lets the fire scream out into the room.

There's nothing but fire so deafening in its design that nobody can hear the redhead yell out one simple word: Guardian.

Flames flicker and whip out against the green barrier around him. Zelos looks up and quickly regrets it, closing his eyes tightly together while he keeps up the protective green orb around his body. Guardian wears thin and falls closer to his body, however. He can feel the heat creeping in close. Body tensing, he pulls his dagger in close to his chest and stays motionless. The only thing on his mind isn't revenge- it's survival.

It begins to cool. There's just smoke now that obscures his view. Zelos counts his blessings and pulls his headband down to cover his mouth loosely. Guardian dissipates completely. He's defenseless and the Jabberwocky is just another shadow in a dusty room of castle artifacts.

"ZELOS!" the cry of his teenage companion makes him turn.

"Fang?"

Had he been captured again? The stupid kid. He made everything so much more difficult than he could handle sometimes.

That's when the claws swipe at him.

It's also when he finds himself flying through the air before discovering his airway was obtruded by something quite large; Like, a wall.

_CRAAAAAAAAACK._

Zelos screamed, short and breathless. Then he passed out.

**_..._**

Fang had ran in with his sword to find the room in flames. There was no sign of his friend anywhere. So he'd done the only thing he could think of. He started screaming, hoping for any kind of reaction.

"Zelos! Zelos!"

No answer.

Fang took the deepest breath his advanced lungs would allow. "**ZELOS**!"

There's a split second of the thought bouncing in his head. The thought of 'he's dead' jumped like a bouncing kangaroo.

_He's dead. He's dead. He's dead. He's dead._

And Fang doesn't think, for one moment at all, that his way home his dead. He's come a long way from his thoughts of Zelos being his ticket back to Earth.

"Fang?"

The fact he hears anything back makes him smile. He's not dead. He's just fine. He's fighting this.

The smoke cleared in a sudden influx of force caused by the claw of the Jabberwocky. A flash of red goes by him and Fang watches the dagger fly out of Zelos's hand and slide to his ked clad feet.

_CRAAAAAAAAACK._

Zelos's eyes widen so much that they look as if they're about to burst out of his head. How he got enough air into his lungs to scream at all, Fang would never know. But he watched the short intake of breath and listened to the sound of his only friend on the planet scream like a small child.

Then his eyes shut immediately and Zelos laid in a heap on the dusty ground.

"Zelos!"

Forgetting the Jabberwocky, Fang ran over to the older man as fast as his legs would carry him. Zelos's wings had disappeared the second he had hit the wall. There was no light about the man. His hair was dull due to the smoke. His pale skin looked gray because of all the soot in the room.

Something was broken. Fang knew that from the crack. He had to get Zelos out of there. He had to-

The growl from the Jabberwocky yanked him out of his thoughts. Slowly, Fang stood up and turned, staring at the monster who had just wounded his friend.

His hand reached down and found the hilt of his sword. He took it firmly in his palms and lifted it as the dragon smiled maliciously. Fang never knew dragons could smile before. But now he knew and he would note it for future reference.

Then he ran, his wings snapping out and thrashing against the air to lift him up.

He lifted his sword, swung down, and shut his eyes as his blade neared the face of the monster.

The Jabberwocky lifted up its claws and began thrusting towards the teenager. Fang quickly turned his body around and he made a move to pierce to body of the beast. His sword touched the scales and made a loud clinking noise in disagreement. As though it was screaming at Fang, 'I can't pierce this skin.'

Fang pulled back and his wings flapped while he hovered. The dragon roared and spun to try and catch the teenager. He ducked at the dragon made a slapping motion once more.

The bottom of the dragon's paw was fleshy. Fang saw the opening, lifted up his sword, and struck.

A scream that made his ears ring exploded through the room and Fang dropped elevation to get away from the sound as much as he could. The Jabberwocky was in hysterics, trying to tend to its wound.

Fang slid over to Zelos's body, checked his barely beating pulse and then proceeded to grab his shield.

"Ungh…" the soft moan makes Fang whip his head around to see Zelos's face contorted into an expression of agony.

"I'll finish this," Fang promised Zelos. He ran back under the Jabberwocky and began to locate the weak spots of the dragon.

The chest. The chest had the same sort of fleshy hair-covered skin that the palm had had.

So he ran, and he jumped up and let his wings carry him the short distance his leap hadn't sufficed in taking him through.

Fang lifted his sword and he pierced the chest of the Jabberwocky.

It screamed so loudly, Fang could only hear ringing after a split second of its wailing. Jerking around, it fell into conniptions on the floor. The large tail slammed into the walls of the once pristine room and a huge hole appeared that lead out to the twilight of the outdoors. Fang sheathed his sword, swung the shield over his shoulder before he picked up Zelos's dagger off the ground and shoved it through one of his belt-loops.

The teenager slid over quickly to the redhead lying on the ground and he hoisted him up into his arms. Zelos began softly trembling in his arms and Fang quickened his pace.

The Jabberwocky's motions had disintegrated into small twitches. Its yellow eyes stared after Fang as he took off out the hole with Zelos secure in his grasp.

One last whimper escaped its mighty throat and then King Irving's pet finally slowed its breaths to a complete halt. The Jabberwocky was dead.

The only problem was, Zelos looked like he would be next on the fatalities list.

Fang swallowed back his doubt and sped up, trying to get somewhere safe.


	18. Another Sigh

**Author's Notes**: Guess who stole the Maximum Ride mangas from her BFF? Meeee. Guess who got new inspiration from them? Meeeee. Here's a little update. Not a big plot-mover but I didn't feel like skipping over ALL the details like I usually do(you notice Fang and Zelos refer back to a lot of conversations that don't happen in the story? Yeah, laziness thy name is Haley). Sometimes you need a little bit of filler for character building.

* * *

Hands. There were hands on his skin… Not a woman's hands though. The thought of being used while weak makes him coil up into himself.

His eyelids felt like they weighed a thousand pounds. Zelos tried harder to make them open. They fluttered weakly and he saw little bits of light and shadows. It hurts so damn much to try and see, though. He finally let his head droop completely and his mouth opened to release a soft groan.

"That thing fucked you up," a familiar voice sighed above him.

What thing? How did it fuck the great Zelos Wilder up? Why was this guy touching him so much?

His eyebrows pulled together as he tried to figure out just which parts of his body were being prodded at by these rough hands. It feels like the touches are everywhere.

One finger gets a little to close to one of Zelos's wounds and he finds himself crying out in pain. Why did he hurt so damn bad?

He tried to open his eyes again and there was another sigh. Whoever was helping him was an impatient son of a bitch.

He reached his hand up and found it was shaking uncontrollably. "Stop it," the voice grumbled, taking his hand and setting it back at the ex-chosen's side.

"Stop what?" he wanted to ask. He even tried. His mouth opened to speak, but all that came out was 'ungh'.

The hands disappeared and Zelos felt an odd moment of vulnerability. Where was he? What was going on? His lungs took a deep breath and they then let it out in soft tremors that hurt more and more with each passing second.

Then the hands were back and poking at his exphere. The gem on his chest was cold and inhuman but it was ever-present on his body. The pressure was light, but he could feel it all the same. It was the same sensation of somebody pressing an amulet down onto a fresh bruise.

His mind hiccups, diving up and down in search for a word that would get the message across of 'that fucking _hurts_'. He settled on the word 'no' but by the time he willed his body to say it, he realized that he had been whimpering and shivering on the ground in agony the entire time he'd been t his tracking down his 'safe word', for the lack of a better term.

Sighing, the person taking care of him reached out and tipped his mouth open more. Zelos shook his head as much as he could in stubborn disagreement, but it wasn't enough. Something was poured in-between his lips and down his dry throat.

The hands were on his face, forcing his jaw to shut now. The Tethe'allan scrunched up his nose and tried not to swallow. His caretaker caught on quickly. Another sigh and the hand was blocking his nasal passages with thick, rough fingers.

Zelos barely lasted a second before he gasped for breath and let the liquid run it's course down the rest of his throat.

Then the hands were gone.

"Zelos, you with me yet?" Fang asked.

Before Zelos could get the strength to respond, he found darkness welcoming him to its abode.

It was obvious when Zelos passed back out. He resumed the state he had been in for the past three days. His body went limp and his chest would take even, yet incredibly shallow, breaths. Those are better than the breathing pattern of when he's in the limbo of awake and asleep. Zelos would lay on the ground in front of him, where the abbey used to be, and start gasping. His body knew he wasn't getting enough air so he just started wheezing.

Fang hated watching it, especially because it was increasing in intervals. More and more he would look over and see Zelos writhing into the ground in pain, his pale fingers digging into the dirt so much that the skin would break and cry blood into the soil. Gulping in air that couldn't make it all the way into his system, Zelos would start shaking violently.

Fang hated it so much.

Before, Zelos was an unshakable tower of abilities and confidence. He helped with the plans and everything else that needed help with. It'd been three days of being alone with his thoughts while overlooking Zelos's weak condition, now.

And Zelos was just so much tinier too.

Never before had Zelos's smaller height been so evident to Fang. Especially when the Tethe'allan pulled himself out of complete unconscious. Zelos would try to curl up into the fetal position every time he got a little bit of control over his body.

It never worked though. Fang would walked over and gently paw at Zelos's limbs to get them back into a setting position. The Jabberwocky had managed to snap so many of Zelos's bones, Fang didn't know which limbs were broken and which were just sprained. Fang had reset them all, though, the very first night of looking after the Tethe'allan.

Zelos had cried all night long from the agonizing pain.

The teenager sighed and glanced over at Zelos. He was quiet and taking those little breaths.

He sat up and grabbed a few of the branches off the ground that he had been using over the course of the last few days. He gently placed them over Zelos's body and received nothing but a soft moan of distaste from the redhead. After covering his friend from sight, Fang grabbed his sword and went out hunting.

The hunting was boring, but it had to be done. He'd done enough of it on Earth while he was living on his own away from the flock, so it was nothing new. Some of the animals were a little questionable in safety for eating and he hadn't gone near any of the foliage because he was feeding the food he found to Zelos too and poisoning him along with his wounds was not something Fang had planned on doing.

Fang walked quite a ways away, not too far so that he couldn't hear if something hurt Zelos, but far enough to get the animals who hadn't been scared away by his cries of pain.

About an hour passed before Fang shot a rabbit. He shot about four more in the course of two more hours. He hoisted the game over his shoulder and headed back to the camp he'd set up where the abbey had once been. Leaning down, he uncovered Zelos, and then set the rabbits on the leaves as he looked the sick man over.

The wounds were bruised and swelled. Zelos's face was just about the only thing that wasn't completely marred. Fang examined the scratches along Zelos's cheek bones, getting close to examine coloring and inspect whether they were infected.

He made a face after he sniffed in too much of Zelos's scent. He reeked of sweat, blood, and just flat out body-odor.

"You better wake up soon, man. I'm _not _going to bathe you."

Zelos laid before him, not reacting to any of his jokes or comments like he usually did.

Fang let out yet another deep rooted sigh before he dragged his feet over to a tree a few feet from his friend. Then he began skinning the rabbits. The only thing that filled the quiet of nature was the crackling of their camp fire.

The avian-hybrid seriously missed Zelos's babbling at this point.


	19. We Need To Move

**Author's Notes**: I've had half of this chapter written for about two months and I just couldn't bring myself to write anymore. But I'm done with a bulk of my school work so I'll probably update more often. Hopefully. I don't freaking know. Don't take any of my promises too seriously. I do still love reviews, however. Just throwing that out there, guys...

* * *

A hole for Zelos would have to be about six feet deep, Fang decided. That would keep him from being dug up by any stray animals who were scrounging around for food. Fang would tie Zelos's hair back into a braid, because that seemed befitting for the noble, and clean him up as much as he could. The hole would be six feet long and four feet deep. To keep any persistent animals off the fresh dirt, Fang decided that rocks would be best to place over the grave. It would be best to get started on the hole sooner than later-

Fang shook the welcoming idea off of him. Zelos was not going to die. He just couldn't. However… His gaze slowly went from the food in front of him over to Zelos's small body. He was getting so thin, but he would hardly eat anything at all. Fang was lucky when he got any water into him. They were nearing the first week marker of Zelos being unconscious. He was no doctor, but this was not any good at all.

The redhead's face pulled together in sudden discomfort and his lips parted slowly. Zelos took a deep breath, but it wasn't rushed like it normally was. "Zelos?" Fang got up and approached the redhead at seeing he was stirring in an unusual manner. Kneeling slowly at the older man's side, he turned him onto his back. Zelos's hands weakly reached up to his face, "My eyes," he groaned out.

The teenager dumbly blinked, "Your eyes…?" Zelos's long white fingers began rubbing at the cakey-goo that had formed on his eyelashes. Oh! Of course! Being asleep for a little longer than twelve hours would make your eyes practically glue shut, Fang could only imagine what seven days might do. He took a little bit of water and dampened a rag he had used to clean Zelos's wounds. Dipping the clean corner in water, he began to wipe at Zelos's eyes. The redhead growled something that sounded suspiciously like a curse word and his boney nimble fingers took the rag away from the avian-hybrid. He wiped at his eyes for a moment before letting his hand fall to the ground with exhaustion. Finally, those bright blue eyes opened and looked up at Fang.

Wow, they were glazed over a _lot._ Frowning, Fang rocked back on his heels, "You've been out for a week. I was getting seriously freaked out."

Zelos smiled- the smug bastard- and let out a hoarse laugh. "I'm well rested, then, I guess," he managed to say with a sand-paper voice.

The texture of that usually bright and confident voice made Fang's face fall. "I set all your broken bones," he said, motioning to the horrible casts he made from wood. He had Zelos's legs and arms tied to the pathetic sticks in different sections. He wasn't sure why he'd done it, but he'd seen it on a movie once.

Hey, he never claimed to be a good nurse.

Zelos's eyes trailed along slowly to his limbs, as though it took a great amount of energy to even make his eyes move. "Oh," was all he said.

"Was that right to do?" Fang was suddenly unsure in his efforts.

"Since I can still move around… It's not very helpful in setting the bones," Zelos scoffed at the teenager. Fang was about to snip something sarcastic at Zelos but the redhead shut his eyes and let out a trembling breath.

"You okay?" Fang frowned.

Zelos let out the breath, "No."

The reply was so honest that it made Fang's chest ache. "You look a lot better than you did before," he tried to cheer Zelos up. The comment wasn't saying much at all in regards to how well Zelos was cheering, but coherency at least let him feel a little less alone.

"Did we…" Zelos opened his eyes after a moment of silence, "Did we win?"

Fang brightened up considerably, "I killed it."

A chuckle escaped pale chapped lips, "Good deal."

"You should rest more, man," Fang suggested.

"We need to move," Zelos changed the subject as his mind gained ground in coherence.

"Excuse me? You can barely even move," Fang stared at him like he had to have misheard Zelos.

"King Dickhead knows where we are, I'm sure," Zelos growled out. Nope, he hadn't been kidding at all. Lucky Fang got to talk another crazy plan out of Zelos's head.

"Well, he doesn't seem to care much. He hasn't done much about it so far," Fang replied, his stubbornness flaring for the first time in a week. Funny how he had managed to find peace with Zelos out of commission. He thought he missed this talkative ass? Fang must have gotten hit in the head during the fight harder than he thought. Zelos was just a walking argument.

"Because he's waiting for me to die," the older man started to struggle to sit up.

"No," the teenager gained ground quickly, and, as soon as he reached Zelos, he shoved him down into the dirt a little roughly. "You are going to fuck all of your wounds up. I'm not going to let you do that. I was this close-" Fang lifted his fingers and separated his index finger and thumb by barely a centimeter, "to starting on digging your graze, Zelos! I was sure you were going to die!"

Zelos's eyebrows were pulled together tightly, but he said nothing underneath Fang's body.

"I can't let you just… just sit up and start being reckless. Not yet," Fang said, a little softer now.

"Get off of me, kid," was the only reply Zelos gave.

Fang eased up off of Zelos's body. "How are you feeling?" he asked him.

The Tethe'allan shut his eyes, "So, you killed the Jabberwocky after it knocked me out, huh?" he ignored Fang's question, "Guess your training was worth something after all. Now, if we can work on your reactionary impulses and impairment consisting of constantly being kidnapped-"

"Zelos, how are you feeling?" Fang tried again.

"-then we'd have something of a little more substance," Zelos coughed in a futile attempt to clear his underused throat before continuing. "The Jabberwocky was a dumb stupid animal. King Dickhead will have to be approached with actual swordplay." Another cough. "I know the idea is strange to you. You probably killed the dragon by whacking away at it with that stamina of yours-"

"Zelos…"

"Not that I'm surprised. You're quite a freak when it comes to all that energy," Zelos took a deep breath after his next cough. He opened his mouth so he could continue his babbling with a voice like sandpaper. Fang frowned as he watched the redhead.

"Zelos, I'll get you a drink," Fang decided.

"I don't want one," Zelos bit out.

"Are you a complete idiot?" Fang snapped angrily at him.

Bright blue(glazed) eyes opened and stared up at Fang. "Excuse you?"

"I asked if you were a _complete idiot_!" Fang hissed. "You're sick! You're _hurt_, Zelos! You need to eat- to drink! Why can't you just listen to me?" His fists clenched and he found his feet planting themselves into the ground, his jaw tightening around his words so they came out with a whipping elastic sort of effect.

"Because you're just a damn kid," Zelos replied. His head lulled back and he looked down his nose at Fang. Zelos was the only person who could look down at somebody while on their back practically paralyzed.

"So are you! You're more stubborn than the kid who refuses to admit he was wrong for stealing his sisters doll! You're an absolute mess, Zelos," Fang returned the accusation passionately.

The ex-chosen grew quiet and shut his eyes after a long moment. His shoulders relaxed slightly as he thought and considered the words.

"I'm right and you fucking know it," Fang's voice filled the silence, still tight.

"You tell me to drink and you don't give me anything to drink out of. I'm not a sorcerer. I can't conjure up bottles of water for my personal disposal, Fang. Go get me some," Zelos's eyes reopened and looked at him as though the exchange had never happened. Now he was smug again.

"One day I'm not going to let the fact you ignore our arguments go, Zelos," Fang prophesized. The anger melted away and was replaced by a colder sort of ravenous hatred for Zelos's mannerisms. He had given Zelos a halo when all he did was lie before him and shiver from waves of continuous pain. "There's no progress from just ignoring problems. We're not going to beat King Dickhead if we're too busy at each others necks."

"Chop chop, Fang. You made an offer, now go fulfill it," Zelos's narrowed eyes were the only tell that he had heard Fang's words at all. The lazy snapping fingers negated Fang from keeping eye contact with Zelos for long. Those fingers made the anger spark and flare again.

"You're a pain in the ass, _old_ man," Fang grabbed up the canteen and went to go fill it up for his difficult friend. He didn't turn around to bother looking at Zelos for his reaction. He just hoped he had pissed the sick man off.

When Fang came back, Zelos had fallen asleep.

Instead of awaking him, Fang just let him sleep. The water could wait. If he woke Zelos up, the redhead might start talking again and he didn't think he could listen to him and not punch his lights out.


	20. Power and Means

Author's Notes: I'm not dead, yaaaaay. I've been snowed in so here's an update. I'll try and update again too, now that we have another piece in our plot to start moving. When the last chapter(which is in sight, I promise) is uploaded, I'll link to a fanmix I'm making alongside this for this story. Now, enjoy!

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Trees shaded them in blotches from the mid-afternoon sun. An aerial view would show the dark silhouette of the tall, lean, avian-hybrid but it would show nothing of Zelos who had taken comfort in using nature as his crutch when he needed one. Slowly bringing into view the dark gaze of the teenager, it could be seen staring over at his heavily shaded emaciated friend.

Fang took a deep breath, stabbing the ground with his long blade and using it as a cane lazily. Zelos ignored the sign of any movement; his hands ran softly and slowly over his dagger as the birds chimed in the background—unaware of any sort of verbal attack that would soon come to pass in the coming moments.

"You're not well enough to be training me," Fang informed Zelos.

"You're not smart enough to take the training while you can. We can't leave this place, we might as well make good use of the time we have to waste here," Zelos returned the tone, his eyes cast down onto his sword while he leaned back against a tree.

They weren't leaving the remains of the abbey just yet. They couldn't. Zelos could barely walk twelve feet without becoming exhausted. So, Fang had proposed they used the time to prepare.

He regretted that proposal as soon as he had realized that Zelos considered the only kind of preparation to be that of the physical.

Fang planted his feet and leaned against his sword just a bit more, looking over at his friend with dark brown eyes that were hidden by shaggy black bangs. Flipping the hair out of his face, he pursed his lips and let one eyebrow arch at Zelos expectantly, "How exactly are we going to train while you stay glued to your tree?"

Zelos glanced up at him, not lifting his head, "Posture- technical things of that sort. We can work on that."

"We could just talk about the plans?"

Zelos's eyes went back to his dagger and he flipped it around his fingers, "No. We can't."

"Why the hell not?"

"Because I'm not exactly sure what to do at this point—I never thought we'd get this far," Zelos admitted, leaning back further into the large oak trunk, letting his head lull slowly back and rest against the old bark. He lifted his aching foot up and let it take a moment without his body weight on it, pressing it against the bottom of the tree as he slowly adjusted so the pain wouldn't ricochet like a screaming rubber arrow of fire.

Fang let his wings stretch out, "Ignoring the fact we have to make a plan is just going to make the plan we decide on suck. We won't have had as much time to work on it—polish it and shit."

"I know, Fang," Zelos breathed, almost inaudibly.

"Maybe you should rest?" Fang suggested.

"No. Run through your stretches," Zelos waved a hand at him in dismissal.

"I already have."

"Well, then do them again," Zelos's head lifted up and he shot Fang a glare along with the authoritative bark.

"How many times should I run through them before you're feeling well enough to just watch me practice?" Fang patronized, "Because, gathering from this display of only five minutes on your feet, you're going to pass out, even _with_ that tree as your crutch."

Zelos silently glared at him before letting his head recline back once more, like his neck could barely even handle the weight.

"There are more rebels out there, Zelos! More of them who can help us! They can rise up alongside us and help us win!" Fang exclaimed.

"What makes you so sure that there are rebels?" Zelos scoffed. "From your extensive conversations with the woodland creatures while I was, unsuccessfully I might add, hitch-hiking a ride to Death's doorstep? Did they help you set my wounds too? How very quaint-"

"Don't be a smartass," Fang snapped.

"Then stop being a dumbass," Zelos came back, just as harsh and twice as sharp, "You assume there are rebels out there because you're from a world of 'democracy', am I right? Because, out there somewhere, there have to be people like _us_. Like Whidmore, right?"

"Of course there are! Nobody takes dictatorship lying down for very long and this thing, whatever it is taking shape of your friend, is a dictator! People rise up against what they see is wrong and this dick is wrong! He's the embodiment of everything that's wrong, Zelos, and you know that I'm right! We just have to find the rebels. They're out there. They have to be, and they'll fight alongside us because they want to live in peace. This hasn't been going on extremely long, they have to be able to remember what society—what _life_—was like before!"

Zelos sheathed his fencer quickly, turning swiftly to look at Fang who stood about ten feet from him. "The fact that you know they remember should make it increasingly clear to you just how bad it is. That, even though they see what's wrong, they don't have the power or the means to change it to what's right."

"Then we give them that power and those means!" Fang pressed.

"_We_ don't even have the power and the means, Fang!" the red-head yelled. "Look around you! We live in the ruins of an abbey! We barely have enough stones to sharpen our swords with. We live off the wild animals that are stupid enough to come near our camp because we aren't strong enough as a whole to leave this place. If they ever wise up, we'll starve because we're stuck here. We have _no_ power."

"This is why I suggested that you rested and we made a verbal plan—at least make a fucking blue-print. Something other than fighting! Fighting can do a lot, but only if there's some sort of strategy, Zelos! It's why I even bring up the rebels. Whidmore was a blacksmith, he had a little bit of means that he gave to us and we had the strength to use what he gave us and make a difference. We killed the Jabberwocky, Zelos!" Fang leaned back slightly, "You act as if that's not a big deal, but it's a move in the right direction and we both know it."

"Whidmore is dead, Fang. You know that too," Zelos hissed, his hand reaching back to hold the tree for something to hold him steady.

"There have to be more out there," Fang insisted.

"So what do you suggest, huh?" the older man demanded, "We go around, passing out flyers, 'join our revolution! We have no plans, one of us is majorly fucked all to hell, and the other is pubescent but we try awfully hard!'" his tone took on an audible less-intelligent tone than his usual way of speaking before he switched back, "It won't work. Nobody will join that. If I wasn't already neck deep in this shit, I wouldn't stay for it either."

"Well, how do you think I feel? This isn't even my fucking world and I'm in your quicksand political bullshit war as one of the major players-"

"Don't flatter yourself," Zelos laughed, "You're not a major anything except a major pain in my ass."

"I'll try and remember that the next time you need saving," Fang's voice was stoic.

Silence and Zelos was letting the words sink inside. Fang's eyes were staring him down and Zelos leaned back completely against the tree.

"Do your stretches."

"Fuck you," Fang countered immediately. "Make a plan, and I'll think about it."

"If we start involving the rebels, we're upping the stakes considerably. There is no room for failure once we tell these people that we're fighting for them," Zelos breathed out.

"There was room before?"

"What are two freaks with nothing to lose in comparison to people with families—people who have things to lose?"

Fang looked down at his sword, leaning back against it as the conversation broke off. Zelos's breathing filling up the air even ten feet away from him.

"Zelos?" his voice was hopeful and so very young in comparison to his speech only moments before.

"What is it, Fang?" Zelos sighed.

"Whidmore… When we win this-"

"_When_?" Zelos laughed.

"When we win this," he continued anyway, "we should bury him. At least make a memorial to him."

"I'll add him to the list," the Tethe'allans voice was bitter and dry as he sunk down to the grass now, still pressed against his precious tree.

Fang pulled the sword out from the dirt and he flipped it easily around his fingers, nimble as he thought to himself. "I'm going to do my stretches now," he announced.

Zelos was asleep at the base of the tree, not catching the words in his slumber.


	21. Goor Goor

**Author's Notes**: I am still adding onto this baby. I've just been a little busy. Oh the woes of the life of a teenager. Just kidding. Here's your story. The more reviews I get, the more apt I am to quicken my updates!

* * *

Days came and went and the planning had trickled down into an unspoken agreement that they would find the rebels. Nothing else made sense to do at this point and starting a resistance was the only thing that the two men could think of that would break the rule of King Irving.

"We should try out Triet first," Zelos announced over the crackling of the camp-fire as they ate the dinner that marked the fourth week of living in the ruins of the Abbey.

"Triet?" Fang questioned.

Zelos took a bite of his meal, "It's a town in the desert. People there live off their skills. There are blacksmiths and potion-makers who make shop in Triet. The population there is also far more substantial than some of the other towns that are left—at least, there were quite a bit of people living there the last time I checked. Which was before you got here, if that helps you get a loose time-frame of how accurate my guesses are." The red-head glanced up from his food to look at Fang to gage his opinion of the suggestion.

Triet was filled with people. Anybody with eyes would join their side. This was it. They could make a group of rebel supporters and end the reign of terror that King Dickhead had put into motion.

Fang couldn't help but smile at the idea.

"What are you so giddy about?" Zelos scowled.

"We're just… We're getting somewhere again," Fang said, "This is the first real goal we've had since we killed the Jabberwocky, Zelos. It's important."

"Psh," Zelos scoffed and took another bite of his meal, "It's something. I don't know if important was ever the word that came to mind when we made the plan though."

"We might be able to find a doctor or something to join," Fang told Zelos, "That would be so helpful. We should look for a doctor first, actually."

Zelos shook his head, "We'll take what we can. There's no sense in being greedy about it."

The Tethe'allan finished his meal and he stood up, tossing the remains of the animal/meal into the fire before he pulled his long red hair into a pony tail. The older man had recovered well once he had gotten to the point of stability where he could heal himself comfortably. Other than a slight limp when he over-exerted himself, Zelos had gained back a majority of his strength.

"When you finish up, we'll pack up what little that we have and head out. Sound good?" Zelos asked him. Then he stopped, "… Actually, we might need to hold it off until tomorrow morning."

"What?" Fang looked at him in confusion. "Why would we do that?"

"You look like a hobo," Zelos sneered in disgust.

The teenager gawked at him. "I'm sorry, what?"

"You're just gross looking. I get that we're in the middle of leading a rebellion, but that's no reason for hygiene to suffer." Zelos crossed his arms over his chest. "Honestly, Fang. You make me want to shower just for the sake of compensation. Do you even remember the last time you combed your hair?" Fang was about to answer but Zelos obviously meant the question to be rhetorical because, with a big breath that lifted his chest significantly, he continued on with his rant. "I _highly_ doubt it. It looks like the nest of whatever animal we just ate. Can you say _ew_?" Zelos asked, once again rhetorically, "Because I sure as hell can. Ew times a billion, in fact."

Fang stared at him in silence. Zelos was a lot of things, but if there was one that never failed to impress him, it was how clean and meticulous the man was. Zelos bathed once in the morning and again at night. He kept himself looking like he had a salon at his disposal, despite the fact they lived off of the fat of the land and the forest around them.

Fang, however, combed his hair once every few days and that was only so it would be easier to wash the gunk, grime, and God only knew what else out of it. Yeah, sure, he would wash himself off in a minute long bird-bath-like swim, but to sit and scrub away all the dirt took time he didn't like using. So, he just didn't clean up all that much.

He never realized it bugged Zelos, but when he thought about it for more than twenty seconds, it made sense that it would.

"Does it really matter?" Fang exasperated, "Nobody is rolling in wealth. I don't think they'll mind."

"They're not rolling in dirt either, you bumpkin," Zelos snipped in a snobby tone that Fang hadn't heard in a while from the ex-noble. "The least you can do is to pretend you want to impress them by washing the disgusting mud and mire off your face so that they don't think you're hiding behind some form-fitting, God awful mask made of the insides of a muck-monster."

His hands lifted up to his hips as he looked down at the avian-hybrid, "I don't know how you bird people interact back on 'Earth'," he lifted his hands and fashioned some air-quotes for Fang's home planet before continuing, "but here? We like to look semi-presentable to the people we're speaking with while starting a revolution."

"If it bugged you so much, why didn't you say anything sooner?" Fang asked.

"It's dark and I'm used to you," Zelos replied.

He walked over and knelt down in front of Fang, beginning to look him over, "Ugh. It's like when you walk into a ghastly abandoned house and all the furniture is still there and you make the mistake of running your finger across the surface of a table only to find it's got four inches of dust on it. Except you're not an abandoned house and I only wished this was dust." Zelos whipped his glove off before running the index-finger of his right hand down the bridge to the tip of Fang's nose.

He lifted his finger tip to show Fang the gunk that had turned Zelos's porcelain skin a dark brown color.

"Oh," was the only response Fang could come up with.

"Oh, _gross_. Oh, _ew_. Oh_, ick_," Zelos began saying, wiping the goo onto Fang's shirt. "I think I would die if I could do _that_ to myself."

"You were pretty messy looking when I met you," Fang reminded.

"I was in _prison_," Zelos replied, lifting his head up in typical snobbery. "What's your excuse?"

"I live in the middle of a forest by the ruins of an old abbey," Fang replied.

"Get your smart-ass into the river and don't come back out until you're clean. Then we'll go to Triet if you look presentable. If you don't, I'm going to force you to look as presentable as you possibly can manage."

"You're such a priss," Fang laughed as he stood up.

Zelos pushed him towards the river, "Don't come back until you're clean enough that strangers can tell that you're white!"

Fang just laughed and jogged to the river. The faster he got clean, the faster they got to Triet.

**xXx****xXx****xXx****xXx****xXx****xXx**

Triet came into their sights a whole hour before they actually were able to walk through the city's gates. When they saw it, Zelos had forced Fang out of his comfort zone and told him to land. They had to walk into the gates on their own two feet, and in the end it made sense why. They were trying to be inconspicuous and flying was the exact opposite of blending in no matter what planet you were from.

Zelos had on his mask that he had worn into Palmacosta, but now Fang had to join him in anonymity with a tighter and thicker black mask made of the material that had once been a part of his old shirt sleeve. King Irving had seen enough of Fang to get wanted posters out to any city he felt the two might visit. Fang was just as much of a fugitive as Zelos was after all the fighting the two had done against the tyrant.

The funny thing was, neither of them cared much about it. It wasn't as if it mattered anyway. They'd been caught before and they'd escaped before. This was yet another obstacle in their already flogged and indiscernible path.

Fang turned to Zelos and the redhead glanced at him. "What?" he asked.

"This is really hot," Fang replied, tugging on the edges of his black mask that wrapped around his head much like Zelos's did.

"We're in the middle of a _desert_, whiney bitch," Zelos scoffed. "So… duh about that whole hot-memo."

"Where should we start?" Fang asked, stopping in the middle of the city gates beside his friend.

"Wherever we can to get a drink," Zelos exasperated, throwing his hands onto his knees as he leaned forward in exhaustion. "I am spent."

The avian-hybrid glanced in each and every direction, "I… I can't tell any of the shops apart," he admitted.

Zelos lifted his head and looked through the slit in his mask that gave his eyes a hole to see through. His hands stayed on his knees though.

"There," he straightened up and headed for the shop as Fang began to follow after. He noticed Zelos moving a little slower but he managed to walk into a small building. Opening the door, he waltzed through first and Fang closed the door behind him, not turning to take in the innards of the small cantina until the exit clicked shut behind him.

He looked ahead to see all the famished and malnourished faces staring back at the two men. Fang straightened up awkwardly, his wings tucking in tighter against his back under his shirt in a self-conscious fashion; however, his wings were just as unseen as Zelos's were.

"Any exit strategys other than the front door?" Fang whispered to Zelos.

"This bar is new… so, I'm sort of winging it," Zelos replied. He turned to Fang, grinning underneath his mask as he added, "You're used to _wing_ing stuff, right?"

Fang groaned at the pun, making Zelos laugh before the two men walked over to a table, sitting down as the eyes of strangers removed themselves from the two to continue what they were doing beforehand.

A woman, eyes sunken to the point that they looked far too large for the skull they were set inside, walked over to them. Her dusty brown hair was pulled back so they could see every crevice in her tired face. She pointed to a chalk board that was hoisted above the bar, "You have two choices of drink. Water or butter tea," she told them with her husky voice.

Zelos and Fang turned to the board in perfect synergy, as if to double check their choices. Fang cleared his throat, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly, since he wasn't too sure of what butter tea was he couldn't imagine picking it over water. "Water," he told her.

Zelos was still looking at the bar, his eyes glued to the board above the mirror that sat behind where a bartender used to work back when business was just starting and the world wasn't hurting nearly as much. "I want goor goor," Zelos said, his eyes going to the waitress.

Her demeanor changed instantly. The waitresses back straightened from its hunched over position from only moments before. "Goor goor and water it is," she said evenly, "I'll need to go into the back. We have a special recipe, and only the owner of the cantina makes our goor goor."

She walked away from them and Fang immediately looked to Zelos with confusion evident in his eyes. "Goor goor?"

"Goor goor is butter tea," Zelos told Fang simply. "Just… a more localized term for it. I knew a boy who drank butter tea a lot, but he called it goor goor. I think it made him feel sophisticated and worldly." He shook his head a few times, "Butter tea is nearly impossible to get anywhere," he felt the need to add.

Fang was still incredibly lost on how the tea meant anything until the waitress came back and set two napkins onto the table in front of them. His water was placed on top of his napkin and a small wooden cup of butter tea was set in front of Zelos, just quick enough that a normal human wouldn't have been able to see there was something written on the bottom of Zelos's napkin. Zelos smiled at the waitress and she nodded stoically before leaving the two.

Fang also noted how Zelos downed the butter tea quickly, making quite a loud fuss over it so Fang wouldn't be tempted to look away from his guzzling mouth to see the red-head's hand grab the napkin and slip it into his pocket.

They had made some sort of progress, Fang could see. Although, it didn't make him too comforted to see how Zelos tried to hide the actions from him.

He assumed that Zelos had done it to distract the wandering eyes in the bar and not to throw the mutant off his game. Whatever Zelos had intended of the two, he had managed to make Fang feel both of the two waves of animosity.


	22. I'm Drowning and You're Just There

**Author's Notes**: Trying really hard to wrap this story up before I head to college in August. I'm going to try for a chapter a week. –crosses fingers- Here's to hoping that works!

* * *

The inn was a quiet place that was just as bland and beige as the desert outside. Fang wasn't complaining about the boring atmosphere though since it was the first time in a long time that they were under a safe roof. Fang found himself sparing a glance over to Zelos who was asleep across from him on one of the two hotel beds placed in their room.

He watched the redhead shake with snores and resounding shudders of pain before his eyes wandered down from Zelos's face down to the small brown bag that held the mysterious note Zelos had received at the cantina.

Fang lifted himself off his own bed to slip over to where Zelos was sleeping. Looking him over, Fang was irritated to find that he couldn't gage just how deep the sleep was due to Zelos's long fire-truck hued hair curtaining his face. Reluctantly, he turned his gaze back down to the little leather satchel.

Shutting his eyes, he made use of his mutation and became invisible at Zelos's side. Steadily, he reached out and took the bag slowly from Zelos's belt. The Tethe'allan groaned in pain, rocking away from Fang slightly.

Fang couldn't afford to get discouraged by that though. He quickly took initiative and snatched the bag into his callused hands. He backed away from Zelos into the shadows so he could look at whatever was on the note in a more secure area. Zelos hadn't awoken or stirred other than the groan, so he decided he was safe.

Nimble fingers untied the leather string that knotted up in a secure manner so nothing spilled out when Zelos was doing anything of the physical. Peering inside, Fang realized that he had never held the small bag before this very moment. He had never previously seen what was inside.

He turned, placing his back against the wall(a habit now after being with Zelos for so long and being kidnapped more times than he liked to remember) and he dug around to find the note. There came a small chink of jewelry inside and Fang paused. He lifted the tiny ring up into his hand, looking it over with curious speculation.

It was a woman's ring, made of the purest gold and embedded with the most flawless of diamonds. If Fang ever saw a ring of this caliber on a woman, he would step back and let her have the right of way immediately. There would be no taunting a woman who wore a ring so beautiful. The way that the diamonds went all the way around the golden band, making a circular endless path to the huge gem on the top of the ring, made it very clear that the woman who wore the ring was greatly loved by a man who would give her anything and defend her to the death.

Fang turned the delicacy over in his hands, looking over the details to see that, inside the ring, there was an engraving.

_"To my favorite Banshee XOXO Zelos"._

"Banshee?" Fang questioned under his breath, turning the ring over a few more times in his hands. The sound of rustling fabric whispered into the quiet of the previously calm room, causing Fang to turn his attention away from the accessory.

Zelos was upright, looking at him with an unreadable expression.

"What do you think you're doing, Fang?" Zelos inquired, his tone tired and irritated all at once in a manner that was uniquely Zelos.

"I was just seeing if you had any money in here," Fang quickly replied, hiding his discomfort by straightening up taller. "I was going to go back out to grab some food."

"It's too late for food, Fang," Zelos evenly said. "None of the shops are going to be open. Just suck it up until morning." He held out his gloved hand for the bag and Fang quickly put the ring inside before walking over and gently placing it into his companion's palm.

"Find anything you like?" Zelos patronized, knowing very well what Fang had found.

"No money, so I'm gonna have to say that I didn't," Fang said, smiling as he took a seat back on his own bed.

"How are you feeling?" He was quick to change the subject, hoping Zelos would take the bait. "You practically passed out when we got our room."

"I'm fine," Zelos fastened the bag to his belt. He turned his gaze to Fang and locked eyes with the teenager.

Fang motioned to the bed, "So the beds are acceptable?" His tone was teasing in more hopes that Zelos would cheer up.

"Better than the ground," Zelos shrugged, sinking down into the covers.

"What's the significance of goor goor?" Fang leaned against the intricately carved, but obviously old and worn, headboard of his bed, and he tilted his head to the left as he awaited Zelos's response.

Zelos stared up at the ceiling, "I was wondering when you would start riding my ass about that." He shut his eyes and his lips drew together in a thin line while he thought.

"Zelos." Fang sat up, pushing up and off the headboard with a slight exertion of his wrists while his large dark brown wings stretched out behind him to adjust to the new position. "What the hell is goor goor and why does it mean anything to anybody here?"

"It's tea, silly," Zelos replied, smiling at his own wit.

"I'm serious," Fang snarled.

"So am I." The redhead hoisted himself up and pressed his back against the wall that supported the greater length of his bed was rested against.

"It's a code, right?"

"You were looking for that note, huh."

There was no question in neither Zelos's demeanor, nor in his tone when he accused Fang. The teenager took in Zelos's stern gaze and decided to stop lying.

"Yeah. I saw you put it in your bag," he admitted. "We've been traveling together for so long now, Zelos. Why don't you trust me yet? I feel like you still feel the same about me as you did the first day we met and that's bullshit because you owe me a lot more by now."

"Because I wake up during instances where you aren't on _your_ guard and I catch you doing shit like digging through my things." Zelos's tone was dead serious and it matched the narrowed blue orbs that locked indefinitely onto Fang's brown eyed gaze. "Who the hell knows what you're doing when _I'm_ not paying attention."

Fang found his confidence faltering. He looked down at the ground for a moment while he adjusted in his seat and tried to think of a good reply to that.

"I don't have a problem with you, Fang. I just don't trust you completely," Zelos continued. "You should know by now that I have an extreme case of paranoia given how my life has been for the past year."

"I get that, man. Yeah, I get that completely." Fang nodded a few times as his head rose once more to survey his partner. "But this is why we're here, right?" His gaze dropped again while he continued adjusting in his spot on the bed, suddenly very restless. "To get information. You got something too, but you decided you would hide it from me even though it affects us the same-"

"It does _not_ affect us the same at all, Fang."

Fang froze and slowly lifted his eyes back to stare into the blue fire that resided in Zelos's scrutiny .

The redhead got up suddenly from the bed like he had been launched solely by the power that his anger gave him. "This situation is _not_ the same for you as it is for me. Don't even start bullshitting me and acting righteous, as though you have any idea about anything about the pre-face to this execrable war you've managed to stumble upon." Zelos's body was pacing back and forth quickly now. "Because you don't, Fang! You don't fucking get to say that we are in the same boat because I'm not in a boat! I'm in a life-raft with no supplies and I'm on the verge of drowning and you're just here." His head reeled while his feet carried him forward, and suddenly the two men were inches apart. Zelos's hot breath was coming down on Fang's face like blasts from a furnace.

"You just get to be here. You're not in this," Zelos hissed. He slowly recoiled away from Fang, still glaring down at the teenager. "No. Not like I am."

The avian-hybrid didn't know what to say or what to do. He just gaped as Zelos walked slowly back to his bed and eased his body onto the hard mattress. "The note dictates that there is rebellion leader here. Somebody I thought had died." Fang was surprised to hear Zelos's voice calm now, although it was a little exhausted from the sudden strain he had place upon his own body.

"Oh," Fang gently breathed. Zelos reclined onto his back and rolled away from Fang so the boy couldn't see his face.

"We'll meet with him tomorrow night. I planned on telling you when we got here, but I fell asleep," Zelos's voice said to the wall.

"Oh…"

Fang was about to say more, but Zelos reached out and covered his ears with his pillow to show the conversation was now terminated.

"We both die if this doesn't work," Fang spoke up.

"What?" Zelos twisted around to look over his shoulder at him.

"You said that this doesn't affect us equally." Fang's straightened up confidently. "It does if we lose. We both get killed."

Zelos smiled tiredly. "I thought you said that failure wasn't an option, hot-shot."

Fang smiled back, "It's not. I just wanted to make sure you remembered that."

"Stupid kid," Zelos scoffed, turning away once more. "Of course I remember. I graduated at the top of my class for a reason."

"Don't lie to impress me," Fang laughed.

"I was," Zelos grumbled under his breath as he drifted off to sleep, "I'll prove it when this is all over. Just you wait."


	23. Smoke

**Author's Notes**: Okay, it wasn't a week after the last update, but this is twice as long as a normal chapter. Here's some backstory. No Fang, but I'm sure you'll all live.

* * *

Red hair, as deep of a crimson as the blood that flowed through the veins of every human, elf, and all those caught in-between, flows down over tanned shoulders. There was a time when his skin had been comparable to blanket of freshly fallen snow.

It was once frowned upon in noble society to have a tan, he remembered. Though, it seemed so long ago that he had been a real aristocratic part of society. Even before things had fallen from their great heights of prosperity and peace in the world, Zelos hadn't been a noble. Not when he had been with Sheena.

He had moved to Mizuho. He had adopted her style of clothing, so that the chief didn't look like she had taken a liking to a complete outsider. That wasn't to say that he had ever fit in wherever he lived before he began living with Sheena—just that he had blended in better with the Meltokians than with the Mizuho ninjas.

The outfit she had given him had stayed within certain comfort zones for him: a black shirt underneath a pink top layer, although this had a bigger since of bohemian style. Anything else seemed out of place on his body other than that dosage of pink though, Sheena had laughed.

There had been far less skin showing in the outfit Sheena had designed for him though. After their journey together with the rest of their companions, the idea had been spread (with good reason) that expheres and their usage were to be frowned upon. So, Sheena had covered his up with a black long-sleeved shirt that flowed over his body loosely while topping it with a short pink vest that drifted effortlessly over the darker fabric. He could have gained a few pounds in the baggy clothes she had cloaked him in. Nobody would have known but the two of them.

"You wear too much white," she had told him. "You'll be filthy within a day of living here in all that stupid white." So the white parts of his outfit had been downgraded to a soft yellow with the exception of his pants which were now a dark black. His headband had been replaced by a patterned cloth with red embroidery and a green border that made it painfully obvious if he ever wore it less than completely horizontal across his forehead. "That's okay." He could still see her smiling as she taunted him. "You'll always keep it straight. You spare so many glances at yourself in anything that can pass as a mirror that it didn't occur to me that you wouldn't be able to handle it."

He had pouted at her for that and she had delivered a little smack to the top of his head in return for all his whining. That stupid busy headband was always lifting on the left side to make Zelos feel more insecure in Mizuho than he had been before the journey of world regeneration, and that was when they had hated him. Sheena, after getting tired of all the whimpering from her fiancé, had attached three charms to the left side of the headband so it would keep it weighted.

Zelos stared into his own blue eyes that the mirror reflected back to him. His classic white headband was even just like he liked to keep it. His hand reached into their jewelry box(he needed to stop calling it theirs. It was only his now) and he pulled out one of the charms. It was custom-made for him, because Sheena knew how much he liked exterior beauty—especially his own—and accessories either made you or broke you. He pinned the charm onto his headband in experimentation.

His headband slumped down quickly over his eye like he was a poor slum boy pretending to be a pirate. Zelos scowled and took the white cloth completely off of his head so he could consider it in his hands. The old outfit of yellow, pink, and black was gone. The custom beads that helped close his dark rose colored duster were probably ash. He didn't know for sure because he hadn't really thought to check at the time for the remains of his clothes.

What was happening? He didn't know anymore. He thought this chaotic lifestyle was all over after Emil and his stupid journey of self-discovery, but then the anarchy had run rampant once more. It wasn't like the Sylvarant Dynasty or even like Cruxis. He didn't know what it was like per-se, other than that it wasn't native to this world.

An alien? Is that what he wanted to call Lloyd? It was definitely a stretch, and it wasn't as though he could prove that Lloyd had set fire to Mizuho with just his pure gut instinct to back it all up; but, when Zelos had run up to the gates of Mizuho—barely able to breathe since he had been running nonstop ever since the moment he had seen the black smoke billowing up into the sky—Lloyd had been there.

Zelos had originally gone to Meltokio on business. He was finishing up everything with the church so he could live almost permanently in Mizuho with Sheena once they were married. Upon heading back to his fiancé, though, he saw an undeniable evil onyx cloud rising from across the bridge.

He remembered little things from school, but most of what he used and applied to his life came from experience. Experience told him that smoke was only black when it was eating through something it shouldn't be eating through. It told him that black smoke came from the dying remains of a house caught on fire, not a small grass fire caused by a few fire-balls.

"What the hell?" he breathed. He took out his map and made sure to double check the area the smoke was coming from.

It was coming from Mizuho.

When he saw the smoke, he had been at the start of the Meltokio Bridge. He remembered the last time he had ran this bridge as his heart pounded in his chest. He had been less motivated by his heart back then and more motivated by his greed. She had been by his side, though. She was always there for him, although he never really had ever deserved it.

His legs were cramping when he took the last step off the bridge and continued tearing through his path to get to Mizuho. The knight who worked at the bridge called after him, but Zelos couldn't hear him. He was sure it was something like, "Are you okay?" or "Why the big rush?"

Zelos wasn't sure how to answer the two questions, even if he _could_ hear them. So he kept running. He would get an answer when he reached that engulfing smoke.

"_Don't run into smoke,"_ Sebastion's voice rang in his head, _"It will disorient you. There is literally _no_ sane reason to run straight into smoke, Master Wilder."_

Zelos had been about ten years old when Sebastion had wasted his breath on the lecture. Well, it wasn't a complete waste of breath. The lectures had all helped groom him into becoming the perfect self-conscious being. He never did anything stupid like run into smoke or jump off of bridges because that would lead to his _own_ harm. It wasn't until he met Lloyd that he started becoming so reckless. It wasn't until he realized that a life without some people wasn't worth living at all.

His feet were moving on their own now like a self-propelled tank as he barged through the woods in disorientation. He always hated the Gaoracchia Forest and the way it could kill his confidence so easily. At one point, his feet had slowed to a complete halt while his head whipped around chaotically in the smoke, causing his hair to slap against his face.

"Sheena!" he yelled out. He was spinning in a circle now. "Sheenaaaa!" he held out her name like he did when he was whining to her about bland food or stuffy Meltokio parties. "Sheenaaaaa! Come on!" he let out a delirious laugh.

Stumbling now, he walked backwards into a tree and let his head lift up towards the sky and the smoke_. That smoke_.

His feet started up again at a faster pace as he pulled his headband down over his mouth. It was no longer white like it had been when he had departed to Meltokio with it. Now it was gray from the fumes that he walked towards.

The rest of his running was a blur. It felt like ages of half hazardous steps before he reached the tiny gate of Mizuho, once the secret city of the ninjas and now the city of ash and ruin.

He jerked his headband down so he could scream out, "Sheena! Sheena!"

His pants were black as he slumped down onto his knees and into the sea of soot. "Sheena...?" He felt his voice give out to a whimper while his eyes darted through the smoke. Then he saw red. There was so much red now.

"Zelos? Why weren't you inside?" Lloyd asked in a voice that was oddly calm.

Zelos's best friend knelt down in front of him, staring at him with serene brown eyes. Lloyd was surrounded by embers, or was that just the house behind him burning to a crisp? Zelos didn't know anymore.

"Sheena. Lloyd, Sheena-a-a," Zelos pleaded with him, pointing into the dying village as his chest tried to give way to heaving sobs.

"She's gone, Zelos."

"Lloyd. Lloyd, no. No-" he couldn't speak anymore. That smog had taken his lungs hostage and now Zelos couldn't even keep his teary eyes open.

"Zelos. Zelos, where _were_ you? Why weren't _you_ inside? Zelos?" Lloyd's eyes were glued on Zelos and his hands tightened on the red-head's pale arms. "Zelos? Hey! Zelos!"

He slumped into an unconscious heap in Lloyd's arms.

Waking up, Zelos had found himself back inside of his Meltokio home with a sickness so extreme he knew of nothing before that could rival the pain. With a groan, he let his eyes open slowly as he took in the familiar environment of rich fabric and even richer furniture.

Nobody was there with him though. No Sebastion to see if he needed anything and no Sheena to give him what he _really_ needed. No Seles, although he hadn't ever really expected her to be at his side when he completely woke up into full attention.

Just as slowly as he had opened his eyes, he let his body ease up. It hurt to do anything. It was as though every little movement in his head was being fought against by some unknown force. He'd never felt like this before and it rightfully freaked him out a bit.

"Lloyd," he moaned as he reached to rub his aching head. There was a cadence of pulsing in his brain that made him think twice about getting out of bed. "Lloyd… Sheena."

All at once, he was hit with a brick of remembrance. Sheena and _the smoke_ and Lloyd standing there screaming at him, "Where _were_ you? Why weren't you _with_ her? Why weren't _you_ inside _with_ Sheena?" then the blurs of Lloyd standing amongst the cinders before he realized that Zelos was there. All that red mixing with something like a darker red and—_smoke— _a sick smile on his lips while he watched the ninja city burn.

_Burn_. Sheena. Sheena was inside Mizuho.

His mind did backflips while his gut curdled into itself. Shaking, Zelos turned and threw up whatever was unlucky enough to have been in his stomach from the night before. "Sheena!" he cried out, figuring that it was better than nothing and having no other name worth repeating on the tip of his tongue.

The door opened. "Oh, Master Wilder." Sebastion quickly walked inside, shutting the door behind him before he hurried to his master and helped him ease his sobbing body back under the covers. "We're having one of those days again?" Sebastion soothingly cooed while he patted Zelos's shoulder and tried to keep him under the blankets he was trying to kick off in a wild fit.

"No, Sebastion, no!" Zelos pleaded, although what he was saying 'no' to he didn't really know.

"Shhh, it's alright," Sebastion held him down a little more forcefully.

"Sebastion- Sebastion-" Zelos wasn't squirming nearly as much now that his butler had placed so much pressure into his weak muscles. "Sebastion, w-what-t's happ-pening? W-what's goi-ing on? I d-d-don't- I don't u-understand- Sebastion… Sebastion, p-please…" His large blue eyes were glued on the older man while he cried. Sebastion sighed as he rubbed his master's arm gently to keep him calm.

His heart breaking every second, Sebastion began to speak. He started telling Zelos for the fifth time that week that Sheena had died in the Mizuho fire that had been caused by a spell gone hay-wire, and, for the fifth time, Zelos replied with sobbing hysterics. He kept saying something about Lloyd, but Sebastion didn't know just what it was. The doctor came in on the thirty minute mark, just like he had done the four times before, and he walked over to the mess of an aristocrat, sedating him back into a calm slumber.

Sebastion quietly walked out of the bedroom and to the living room where Lloyd was sitting on the couch. "He's getting a little better," he told Sir Bud. "I think he's remembering more and more of it. It makes hurts him, but…"

"It's progress all the same. Yeah, I know what you mean," Lloyd mused on the couch. "Is he saying anything that makes any sense yet?" he asked, his tone coated to the rim with sugar-lined concern.

"No. Nothing yet," Sebastion replied.

The swordsman eased up to his feet, "I feel so bad for him. It hurts for everybody, but, for him, it must be… absolutely _devastating_."

The large word took Sebastion by surprise when used by Lloyd but he smiled politely at the twenty year old hero. "It is, but we're all hoping that he bounces back at a healthy pace."

"I'll be back tomorrow," Lloyd said as he shrugged into his red jacket. "Same time as usual."

"Well, you're always welcomed here, Sir Bud," Sebastion bowed.

"God damnit, Sebastion," Lloyd suddenly hissed. "My name is Lloyd. Lloyd Irving. Get it right."

Sebastion gawked at the door well after Lloyd stormed through it and out into the Meltokio streets.

It wasn't until the memorial for Sheena and the entire village of Mizuho came that Zelos could say with confidence what he had seen on that day through the black fog had been very real. He watched the ground in silence as Lloyd sat beside him with the rest of their comrades and knew that Lloyd was no longer there.

Zelos would have gone to Regal or Raine or anybody about it, too, but then he realized that they weren't there either. These people beside him were shells. Lloyd kept sparing glances at him all during the priest's speech, as if to check if he was a shell yet. Zelos's head pulsed with the intensity of amplified timpani drums while he numbly directed his gaze at the dirt below his feet.

"Where's Genis?" He had asked Raine softly when the service was all over and they were all inside his home. Raine spared a glance at Lloyd who stayed solemn and silent before she turned her ice blue eyes to Zelos and said "He was in the middle of something that couldn't be dropped. He'll come by to visit soon and give his condolences."

"Anybody know where Emil and Marta could be?" Colette asked in a chipper tone that wasn't sincere. Colette had a happiness that could not be faked by anybody. She was a shell. Zelos watched her as Lloyd replied with "Nobody could find them."

"It's a shame. Marta was very close to her," Regal said with no emotion.

_Her name was Sheena._ Zelos cried out inside.

"Indeed," Presea crooned.

Zelos got up from his seat quickly and went up the stairs as quickly as his feet would take him while the five watched him stumble over himself to get somewhere safe.

A year later and here he was, staring into the mirror with dead blue eyes while he played with old charms while thinking of old clothes, the pounding still in his brain but he didn't notice most of the time because the pain had become casual. What were they waiting for? Why didn't they just kill him or possess him or whatever the hell it was that these parasites did?

He saw _them_, slinking around in the shadows as they awaited the perfect opportunity to come at him and tear into his broken soul. It wasn't as if he was a threat to whatever those things were though. Killing Sheena had been the best thing they could have done in order to make Zelos compliant.

He slowly rubbed into his temples. "Shit!" his hands slapped down onto the counter filled with remembrances and he shoved them onto the ground. The more vulnerable trinkets broke while the stronger ones clang loudly against hard tile.

With his chest heaving, Zelos let the tears fall to the ground. He had always grown up accustomed to being a puppet, but never like this. Never had helplessness ever been inside every nook and cranny like this. Prison would be better than a life so convoluted.

He froze. _Prison would be so much better…_


	24. They're Not Parasites

**Author's Notes**: An ending is in sight! I'd say there's about 7-10 more chapters left before this baby is wrapped up. I've got my conclusion settled on, now I've just gotta write it all out.

* * *

"_Who do you think would last the longest out of all of us?"_

"_What the hell kinda question is that?" Zelos choked out a startled laugh, looking at Regal with raised eyebrows. "A little dark for poker game chatter, don't you think?"_

_The blue-haired older man shrugged, lifting his hands up so his palms were visible. His head tilted as he considered Zelos's reaction and how to explain himself._

_Lloyd's nose scrunched up, but he seemed curious enough at Regal's inquiry. "A little out of place too," he agreed with Zelos despite himself._

"_Our lives seem to be naturally chaotic and we are all proven to be incredibly reckless," Regal explained, the only noise behind his calm voice was the shuffling of cards coming from the corner that Genis occupied and the impatient tapping of fingers from Zelos's spot beside Lloyd._

"_It raises the question, who do you think will last the longest? Just hypothetically, of course," Regal smiled warmly as if to assure them the conversation was harmless._

"_Who cares," Zelos scoffed but Lloyd was soon speaking with an urgent tone in his voice that showed that the conversation hadn't sparked a hypothetical train of thought in his mind at all._

"_What happens then? If we die! Who handles all the change we've started!" Lloyd was suddenly concerned and Zelos turned to look at him with an amused smirk on his lips. He could almost see all the threads that held Lloyd's mind together start to unravel as he realized that he wouldn't always be there to keep the peace. "We've seen what happens if somebody can't take orders correctly or misunderstands them—chaos!"_

"_Lloyd, it's just a question," Regal was coaxing him now, smiling warmly at his good-natured friend's needless worry._

"_I dunno. It's perfectly reasonable to ask, given all of our histories," Zelos commented, giving Lloyd a side-long 'get over this now' glance, even though his statement was backing the red-cladded hero one hundred percent of the way._

"_I think Lloyd would last the longest," Genis spoke up now._

"_Oh, do you? I can feel your confidence for me oozing from your pores, so why lie about it?" Zelos's blue eyes rolled to accompany his sarcastic gibe._

"_Why me?" Lloyd asked, his apprehension now replaced by thick layers of familiar confusion._

"_You always last the longest," Genis laughed. "You're the strongest-"_

"_I resent that."_

_Genis continued as if Zelos hadn't spoken at all, "And you're the most stubborn." The teenager looked at Zelos with a smirk, "You can resent that," he informed him._

"_Ohoh, thank you, kind sir," Zelos sneered._

_The teenage half-elf chuckled before standing to his feet. "I'm going to get us some more goor goor, guys."_

Just as fast as the moment appeared, it was gone from his memory once more, making Zelos feel chills rocket down his spine.

He had forgotten how Genis hadn't been there at the funeral. For a long time, while he rotted in prison, Zelos had assumed everybody was dead, even the teenager.

Genis had been as absent as Lloyd or Sheena, after all. They were all equally dead to him. Zelos pressed his head into the cold wall that ran adjacent to his bed and let out a shaky breath. His hand reached up to his shoulder and he began to feel for a blanket, as if the chills were caused by something physical he could control. He felt the scratchy wool from the blanket and tugged it tighter over his body.

"Zelos?"

An involuntary grunt came from his chest at the sound of a young male voice, and he pressed his forehead harder into the wall, the pressure becoming the only real thing connecting him to the world his body lived in. Although, with every second that passed, he felt himself pulled gently back into reality.

"… Zelos?"

There was a new voice, but it wasn't really new at all. It was more familiar than Fang's voice in fact. There was a tone of youth in this voice as well—a young boy of a smaller build than Fang was.

"He's not with us right now."

"Does this happen often?"

"Often enough since I've known him."

What the hell was_ that_ supposed to mean.

"I wish I knew healing artes," the younger voice sighed. "My sister specialized in that. I'm not… I'm not of any help to him right now."

"That's okay."

"Are you sure?"

"You being here, with your history and whatever, is enough," Fang sounded so much older compared to the voice of the other boy. "It's a lot more than he had when we got here a week ago."

A week? They'd only been in Triet for two days, tops. Zelos opened his eyes into slits, turning his atrophied neck-muscles so he could see who was speaking in their small hotel room.

A tall and very familiar boy with olive-skin was looking back at him. His dark brown eyes widened only a little at the sight of Zelos looking back at him. Fang wasn't usually one to look as emotional as he felt. His lips pursed to form a puckered line of worry. "Zelos, are you feeling better?" they opened to ask.

"Was I sick?" his voice sounded strange in his throat, like he hadn't spoken in ages.

"You've been in bed for five days," the new-but-not-really-new-at-all voice said and Zelos struggled to figure out from where it was coming. "Sounds pretty sick to me, idiot."

Zelos's eyes shut from the exertion. He couldn't find the owner of the new voice at all. He was there, probably only a few feet away from where Fang was standing, and yet he was out of Zelos's line of sight. His chest heaved, "I'm not… I'm _not_ sick," he informed the two boys in the room.

"I think you just exerted yourself too much by coming here," Fang was speaking again, sounding so oddly reminiscent of Kratos that it made Zelos's stomach ache. (He would kill for Kratos's help right about now.) "It was a pretty long trip. That, on top of the heat and your injuries? Well, you just got into bed and never really had the energy to move since."

"I've been coming here for the past four days to make sure you didn't decide to die while I'm working in town," that new-old voice was speaking up again in a warm yet bossy manner. "You made an appointment. I know you usually don't keep well with dates and times, given your dirtied reputation, but I like to maintain a bit of order around here."

"You are… such a brat… Even now… after all of this has happened…" Zelos's voice faltered and faded, sleep overcoming him from so much exertion yet so little action. Fang felt sorry for the man who was ten years his senior, yet unable to move his neck more than a few inches without exhaustion overcoming him. Fang's eyes then went to the silver haired teenager standing across the room from him.

Genis Sage had obviously never been extremely close to Zelos. It was clear just by how the two always seemed to have a default amount of buffer space between them, even when one of the two was unconscious, that the relationship had never been reminiscent of real friendship. There had been a joint situation, Fang had gathered over the past week, which had been all-inclusive in many ways but had caused separation among their group. It had caused relationships with other people that were of common acquaintance of the two men, but it had never caused the two of them to get to know each other due to how large of a group they had traveled in. Zelos and Genis were of the same circle of friends, but something told Fang that, if left in the same room with one another, it was only bickering that transpired between them.

The silver-haired teenager didn't seem to notice Fang watching him. His clear sky-blue eyes were locked on Zelos's weak form and his young expression was weary. "I had assumed they had gotten him a long time ago. What with his heavy influence in Meltokio politics, it just seemed natural that he would be one of the first to get hit…" Genis was mainly talking to himself, Fang gathered. The prodigy half-elf seemed to have a habit of it.

"Until you two got here." Genis turned his attention to his fellow teen with narrowed eyes. "I thought that Zelos was why everybody else got possessed. I mean, the only people who are gone are the people who have come in contact with him on a regular basis… Although, I stand corrected, seeing as how he's here."

There came a _tsk_ing noise from Genis clicking his tongue against his teeth, his eyes going back to Zelos with distaste evident in his expression. "_Well_… however much of him is here, I mean."

Fang straightened up a bit, pressing his back into the wall while staying relatively close to Zelos's bedside. "You said 'possessed'." Genis's gaze lifted from the red-head. "Zelos said something like that when I first got here." Fang's arms uncrossed from over his chest so he could pull his hair out from in front of his eyes, giving Genis his firmest of looks. "Do you know what this thing is?"

Genis shrugged, putting one hand in the air— palm up—while the other hand mirrored the action at a lower altitude, keeping it closer to his hip than his shoulder. The half-elf shrugged once more, looking like an uneven scale. "I think it's a parasite. I'm not sure if it's a biological kind or if somebody is remotely controlling the parasite components with a new kind of technology, but there is another thing I've thought of. The idea that our friends have been cloned does occur to me occasionally."

"What makes you so sure it's a parasite as oppose to a replica?" Fang asked.

"Convenience," Genis admitted, his hands dropping. "I mean, if the technology to clone is out there then it stands that the technology to possess somebody is as well. I've seen possession on a minor scale before, too. And…" His expression fell into one of sadness and his eyes turned to Zelos, "And to think that all of our friends are dead and cloned…" His face hardened into the contours of anger. "It makes me sick," he snarled. "I don't want to think of that option. Not yet. Not if there is anything else to consider."

"Yeah…" Fang looked up at the ceiling. "You're right."

"Whatever this is, I won't know until I get close to somebody who is possessed and examine them," Genis said.

"What?" The taller teenager was back to giving Genis all of his attention.

"I don't want to assume forever," Genis scoffed. For all their bitterness towards one another, Zelos and Genis were actually rather similar, Fang noted inwardly.

"I need to look at one of them, to make sure. If there's any chance that it's a physical type of possession, than it can be cured. Getting this cured is my top priority."

"Oh…" Fang said oh-so intelligently.

"Don't worry," Genis sneered, "I'll wait until Zelos is better before I consider those details further."

That caught Fang off-guard. "What?" he gawked.

"You're obviously more preoccupied with his health than you are with everything else going on right now," Genis commented, his hands on his hips obnoxiously. "I'll need your help _and_ his for when we've apprehend one of them. It'd be better for _all_ of us if you were focused too."

"Oh," Fang repeated. He suddenly felt an urge to explain himself to Genis, who seemed to think that he was in awe of Zelos's elder status when that wasn't the case at all.

"It's not that I'm preoccupied because… Look, you—" Fang's tone took a pouty sort of intonation and he quickly made sure to get rid of it before he continued. "He's my friend, and he's the only real friend I've had since I've gotten here so I want to make sure he's okay and stays okay for as long as I can help."

"So you can get back home to Earth. Yeah, I heard this story the first time I talked to you," Genis rolled his eyes.

"It's beyond that now," Fang snapped in irritation of Genis's assumption. "At first, it was just to get home, but now… Now he's in need of some help. Just like you are," he accused.

"I don't know about you, but I'm fine," Genis commented, turning and leaving the room in a swift and graceful movement so that silver hair and the back of his blue outfit was the last thing Fang saw of him.

"That makes one of us," Fang mumbled as he plopped onto his bed, turning back so he could look after Zelos's sick form.

His friend's eyes were open. "It's not a parasite," he told Fang in a hoarse whisper.

Fang was so surprised to see Zelos awake, that the words took a moment to sink in. "What?"

"It's… It's an alien…" Seconds passed before Zelos was unconscious once more.

Fang reclined back onto his bed and stared dumbly in front of himself.

Well, that just cleared_ everything _up.


	25. Tightly Knit Community

Author's Notes: I am alive. College is suffocating. Here's a new chapter. Cool.

* * *

An alien made as much sense as a parasite or a clone at this point, but that did not stop Fang from doubting the reality. Why in the world would Zelos think that it was an alien and why had he not mentioned the theory until that moment? Fang could not answer those questions on his own so he had found himself wandering the streets of Triet, eyes glued in front of him but not really seeing anything that helped eliminate the confusion.

If these were aliens that were doing this (which Fang reluctantly admitted seemed possible, considering that Fang was from another planet himself), what did they look to profit from by taking over the positions of a couple of war heroes? Fang thought it through again and again, coming up empty handed each time he rolled the thoughts through his mind.

Fingers tightly clenched into his palm, his hands shoved deeper into the depths of his pockets. One dirty shoe kicked at the sand right as a gust of wind whipped the tiny rocks up and into his eyes. Scowling, Fang shut his eyes and began to wipe away the dirt from his stinging dark orbs.

When he reopened his eyes, he found himself face to face with the small oasis that Triet centered its life around. He sighed and lurched forward slowly, easing into a squatting position as he looked out at the waves.

There was also the fact that Zelos was delusional. Anything he said had to be taken with a grain of salt, Fang grudgingly noted. He ran a hand through his hair, taking off his black mask so that it hung around his neck like a newly invented scarf. The people in Triet were so far from Meltokio that they had either no means to report Zelos and himself or they didn't want to. Either way, the town had become a haven over the past week, further amplified in safety by the fact that Genis was there.

Fang's stomach curdled at the thought of Genis. He was a sour boy of his own age, but something about him rubbed him raw after more than a few moments. Although he appreciated the silver-haired mage's help, he didn't trust him any more than he trusted the nameless inn keeper who had given them a discount for their rooms.

"This is the first time I've seen you without that mask on your face. Why is that?"

Fang turned his head, lifting his chin up to look into the honeyed brown eyes of the woman who had spoken and found himself surprised by what he ended up seeing.

She had a raspy voice, which had made him suspect an older woman worn by age and the world around her. Fang had pictured something tougher than the blonde girl before him. She was tall by the standards of a normal human, although she didn't hold a candle to Fang's own height. Probably around 5'10" but the heels on her boots made him second guess himself. The brown boots were as dark as mahogany wood and they reached up to the middle of her calf. The boots were curtained by a sheer red skirt that gave just a peak of the girl's tanned skin before a thicker red skirt underneath the transparent layer covered her from just under her bottom up to the clinging cut that rested the skirt comfortably above her hips. Her shirt was white, long sleeved only for the sake of decoration, as it too was sheer and thin. In fact, the only part of the shirt that had enough clothe to actually hide her body, Fang realized with reddening cheeks, was the white stripe of thickened fabric that ran across the girl's bust and lifted her breasts up for support.

There was no jewelry on her neck or wrists, but two tiny hoop earrings made of copper hung from her left ear. All of her long frizzy blonde hair had been braided and twisted so it only rested on the right side of her head. She was pretty. If Fang had seen the girl in normal clothes and simply glanced at her, he would have thought she was Max. Upon anything longer than a two second glance, though, it was clear that this tanned and yellow-haired girl was not Max at all.

"You don't say much do you?" She smiled a small smile, accompanying it with a tilt of her head and the sliding of both of her feet so, in just a few short moments, she was now sitting right beside him with caramel eyes locked on his face.

"I was just… thinking about something." Fang turned away from her to look at the water because he wasn't sure just how long he could look at this girl's face without his eyes wandering to her chest.

"Hopefully you were thinking so hard so you could answer my question."

"What?" Fang looked back at her for just a moment before turning back to the water.

"Your mask!" She leaned over and into his personal space, lifting her hand to grasp the black fabric around his neck. She tugged a few times, causing Fang to lean back in compensation so he didn't fall over. A scowl came to his lips and he flicked her hand away. "I've never seen you without it until just now. What's up with that, pretty boy? I thought you might have been deformed." She smiled larger and let her hand rest on the ground between them, still leaning close towards him.

"What's your name?" Fang asked, scooting away from her just a bit so there was a bit space between them.

"You never answered my question."

Fang arched his eyebrows and smirked, sending her a silent 'I don't really give a shit' look.

"My name is Vinny," she announced.

"Fascinating," Fang said.

"Don't be a shit-head. You're the one who asked," she snipped. The smile turned into a pout and she glared at him. "Why the mask all this time?" she demanded once more.

"I have a rare skin disease."

"What's it called?"

Fang stared at the water and said nothing.

"Fine," Vinny exasperated. She stood up to her feet. "I can take a hint."

"Could have fooled me," Fang mused, a light smile forming on his lips.

"You turn away many more girls and keep hanging with that she-man and people will get the wrong idea," she warned.

Fang turned and looked up at her. "You've seen him?" he inquired.

"Well, it's a tight-knit community. Genis told us you two were on our side and a little about each of you. Granted, we got more information about the pretty-boy than we did about you." Vinny rocked back and forth, rotating a bit with the help of her heels. "He said we could trust you though." Her eyes locked onto his eyes, saying nothing now.

There was a silent inquiry in her gaze that made Fang feel suddenly guilty. The reason they were in Triet was to make allies and here he was turning this girl away simply because he wanted to sulk.

"You can trust us," Fang assured.

She smiled again. It was a chipper sort of smile that gave sight to an endless energy. "I hope so. We've been waiting for a messiah, mister." She turned to walk away from him, getting about ten steps away before Fang stood up.

"Vinny!"

She turned her head and arched her left eyebrow. "Yeah?"

"My name is Fang." He was standing now too. His face was oddly serious for such a casual sentence.

Vinny smiled. "Nice to put a name to the face," was all she said before turning and sauntering off to the inside of the city.


	26. Insinuations

Author's Notes: I needed to take a break from studying for finals, you lucky dogs. This chapter got finished way sooner than expected.

* * *

"You told people about us? You told them who we are? We're wanted! You understand that, right, brat?"

Now, Fang shouldn't have been surprised. He was always getting so surprised by how everything turned out and, as time progressed, one might assume that he would adapt to the crazy world around him and just stop being so damn shocked about everything that transpired. It turned out, though, that he was just as off-balance as ever with how things were going.

The tiny little hotel room where he and Zelos had been staying was currently holding three people: himself, Zelos, and Genis. The difference between this moment and every moment before when they had all three been inside was that Zelos was conscious. He was also in a fervent rage.

Of course he was. No need to be surprised. Honestly, all Fang had done was walk in after his encounter with Vinny, spotted Zelos sitting up on the bed with a cup of water in his hand and a silver-haired teenager sitting across from him, he, too, also comfortable and cross-legged on the same cot. Then Fang had said to Genis, "I met Vinny. She seemed nice."

Zelos had looked at him with an irritated turn of his head and narrowed eyes. "You talked to a stranger?" he had interrogated.

"She said she was on our side. Genis had already told her about us anyway."

Then Zelos had swiftly kicked Genis so he flipped over and slammed into the ground. Thus bringing everything full circle and to the current situation.

"You told people about us? You told them who we are? We're wanted! You understand that, right, brat?" Zelos was practically hissing at Genis, slamming the glass of water onto the nightstand.

"What the hell! What's your problem?" Genis snarled from the ground, lifting his head and glaring at the red-head who was hunching over so he could scowl right back.

"My _problem _is the fact you went and told the entire town about Fang and me!" Zelos snapped.

"The entire town is a haven for people against the rule of that imposter," Genis informed Zelos. He puffed out his chest and pulled himself up to his feet, now at eye-level with the ex-noble. "They are on your side." Genis reigned back his disgust and quirked an eyebrow in a smug fashion.

"They are on _our_ side," he revised.

"How can you be so sure that our side exists at all?" Zelos demanded from Genis.

"Is that even a real question?" Genis scoffed.

"We're dealing with something that can disguise itself into completely different people and entities." Zelos was staying serious, still glaring at Genis while he spoke. "How can you safe-guard your side if you don't even know if the people you're dealing with are genuine." No question in his voice because Genis held no viable answer.

"What would you have me do? Catch head-colds and collapse in random hotel rooms with bird-kids?" Genis mocked.

"I am _right_ here."

The exasperation gained Fang no ground.

Zelos grabbed a vase from the night-stand and chunked it at Genis who caught it quickly. "_You're_ the one I'm left with. Of course you are." Zelos sneered.

"Don't sound so thankful that you got somebody at all," Genis retorted.

"Thankful!" Zelos began to laugh and Fang awkwardly stepped away from the two fighting males. "Thankful? For what? For you? For getting _you_ out of everybody else? Not only are you just a _child_, but you are as big of a coward as I am!"

"I am not!" Genis's arm flung out as if to ironically help prove his point.

"Ohohh! But here's the thing!" Zelos stood up and took two swift steps so he was nose-to-nose with the half-elf. "You _are_! Anything less than a coward would have been taken over, or even killed like the others were! You think it's a coincidence that _we're_ the ones who were left behind? Heheh."

Zelos rocked back ever so slightly and began to laugh now. "We couldn't hurt these bastards even if we tried. Hehehhh."

Genis pushed Zelos away. "The difference between your cowardice and mine is that I grew out of mine years ago! What's your excuse, Zelos?"

"I don't _need_ an excuse." Zelos's laughter had suddenly died and he was glaring down his nose at Genis.

"Hey hey hey!" Fang raised his hands up. "We're all on the same team! The enemy of my enemy is my friend? You know… All of that…?" he quickly took another step back at the simultaneous whipping of oddly-colored heads and the staring of penetrating blue-eyed glares.

Zelos was the first to turn back to the fight. "Get out, Genis. You're obviously too careless for us to bother teaming up with."

"You are still an idiot after all these years, aren't you?" Genis's fists clenched and he held his arms tightly by his side. "You have nowhere else to go! No one else to go to! What could you possibly expect to achieve by turning away your sole ally? I can guarantee that you won't find any other people willing to fight for you other than those here in Triet and the people here follow _me_."

Zelos smirked and reared his head back. "I found one in Palmacosta. I'm sure I can find more."

"What happened to the one you found in Palmacosta, eh?" Genis demanded. "Why aren't they here, stupidly following your madness like the bird-kid? Where are they, Zelos?"

Zelos's confidence faltered, thick red eyebrows pulling together into a tight line.

"That's what I thought. Come find me when you've decided to act your age. I'll be leading the rebels." Genis turned to strut out of the room. There was a certain amount of smugness Zelos couldn't bear to let leave unharmed.

"Contain yourself from telling them all of my secrets. I do enjoy being one of the only people with hair this soft and if you go babbling about what shampoo I use, I'll be pissed." Zelos had straightened up and delivered the line like his pride had never been hurt by the reminder of Whidmore's execution.

Genis said nothing except, "You ass," before he shut the door behind him.

Fang immediately turned to Zelos and watched as the red-head plopped down onto the bed and began rubbing at the back of his head.

"You feeling okay?" Fang asked.

"Little twerp. We can't afford any fuck ups. I don't care if he was Lloyd's best-friend, he is being stupid." Zelos was grumbling to himself before crossing his arms and falling back onto the bed so he could stare up at the ceiling.

"So, you seem a little frustrated." Fang wasn't being sincere. He really didn't care how angry Zelos was about Genis. If anything, Zelos had overreacted, and the best way of informing him of that mess-up was by being mocking.

"Damn right I'm frustrated!" Zelos hadn't caught the sarcasm. "He thinks he can just tell them all about us! As if he has the right!"

"I really don't get what could happen that is so much worse than what's already happened." Fang shrugged. "It's not as if we can get anywhere if we don't risk something of ourselves, even if it is just the barest semblances of our personalities."

Zelos's eyes turned to him in confusion.

"She didn't even know what I looked like or my name—just that I'm rebelling with you and Genis. She knew that because she works with him as a confidant, I'm sure." Fang smirked. "You got worked up for nothing. There is literally nothing wrong with what he did, you psycho."

"He's arrogant." Zelos turned his head away stubbornly and glared at the opposite wall.

"Are you feeling any better?" Fang tried again.

"My blood pressure feels a bit high, but, yeah. I'll live, hot-shot," the redhead mumbled out of the corner of his mouth.

Suddenly, so suddenly that it caused Fang to jerk back a little in surprise, the redhead sprouted to an upright position and stared at Fang with a huge smile on his face.

"Uhhhhm…?" Fang took another step back.

"She. Her. Sheeeeeeeeee." Zelos held the E out, making it bounce with unseen excitement.

"Yes?" Fang still didn't risk going any closer to the older man.

Zelos bounced up to his feet and closed the distance anyway. "You met a giiiiiiiiiirl!"

Gloved fists closed around Fang's shirt and jerked him down a few inches so he could be nose-to-nose with Zelos.

"Well, yeah. That's what I said when I walked in! Y'know, right before you tore Genis a new asshole? Remember that?" Fang slapped at Zelos's hands but he had a surprisingly strong grip for a man recovering from an illness.

Blue eyes narrowed mischievously and one eyebrow lowered while the other arched suggestively. "So, she was nothing special, hmmmm? She has nothing to do with why you defended Genis's terrible decision making?"

"Are you insinuating something?" Fang finally broke Zelos's grip and tore back with four rapid steps.

"I'm not insinuating _no_thiiiing." A few more eyebrow quirks and a cocky smile caused Fang to roll his eyes.

"She is just a girl."

"They always start out that way, don't they?" Zelos hummed thoughtfully.

"I am not going to get involved with someone from this… this-" he struggled for the word, "-place! You idiot. That is a bad decision if I've ever heard one."

"Well, compare it to Genis's bad decision and see what you come up with, kid," Zelos suggested smugly as he sat back down.

Fang groaned and took a seat on his own bed.

"What's her name?" Zelos's voice inquired. The redhead was looking at Fang curiously now.

Giving up, the avian-hybrid exasperated, "Vinny."

Zelos suddenly made a weird squeal noise that gave way to giggles.

"What now?" Fang grumbled at him.

"You remembered her name! Guys never remember the names of girls they aren't interested in!" Zelos chimed.

Fang moaned and let his head rest in his hands.

"… Maybe guys like _you_…"


End file.
